


In the Shadow of Dreams

by electricshoebox



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Inception (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Inception Fusion, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Demons, Dreams and Nightmares, Hopeful Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Minor Character Death, The Fade
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-09
Updated: 2017-09-09
Packaged: 2018-12-25 16:30:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 28,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12039813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/electricshoebox/pseuds/electricshoebox
Summary: A loose Inception AU based in a modernized Thedas, where technology evolved under the heavy influence of magic. Magic has weakened significantly over time, the Fade and demons are hotly debated topics of literature past, and dream extraction has taken the Game to a new level. Bull, a former Ben-Hassrath extractor turned independent dream security contractor and his team are tapped by the fledgling Inquisition to run a dangerous, impossible mission: inception. They plan to bring down their enemy by targeting the dreams of his right hand mage. To complicate matters, the plan’s being conceived by the only person known to have accomplished inception successfully: dream architecture expert Dorian Pavus. But Dorian and Bull have a complicated history. And Dorian’s being haunted, or possibly hunted, by the ghost of his success, something he's beginning to believe is more than just a projection. To succeed, they'll have to overcome and face the past, and maybe, just maybe, find love again along the way.





	In the Shadow of Dreams

**Author's Note:**

> This monster has been lurking in my head for a long time, and the minibang presented the perfect opportunity to finally do something about it. It's a messy marriage of Fade lore and Inception mechanics, complicated by so many feelings along the way. Please do heed the tags: there is a frank retelling of a suicide in the story, though the details are left minimal, and some graphic violence. If either of those bothers you, I've put notes at the bottom of the story of where to skip (to avoid putting spoilers here). 
> 
> This story wouldn't be possible without some seriously amazing people. 
> 
> Nele/fanjapanlogist is my art partner for this monster, and I could not have asked for a more enthusiastic and amazing artist. Not only is the art fabulous (and you'll see it throughout the story), but she absolutely kept me going with questions about the universe and plot, trading ideas, and just general inspiration. I seriously don't think I would've made it if not for her excitement keeping me motivated. Please go fawn over the art, she worked so hard and did SO MUCH more than I would ever have expected, and it's gorgeous.
> 
> Katie and June were my awesome betas. Thank you both for being willing to read through this whole thing multiple times, and for being unafraid to tell me when to kill my darlings to get the story where it needed to be. I deeply appreciate your insight, your eyes, and your encouragement.

Sand. He felt it under his fingers, against his cheek, scraping beneath his horns as he turned his head. A rush of water burst cold and gritty against his legs. He knew this feeling.

For one solid, awful moment, he breathed in salt and felt the sun and tried not to panic.

 _The tide rises, the tide falls._ He closed his eye -- single eye, an empty, gnarled space where the other might sit, remember that, _remember_ that -- and repeated the words in a whisper lost to his own ears under the wind. The tide did come, sweeping over his feet, his knees, soaking his trousers. He pressed his hands into the sand, and he rose.

It didn’t look the way he remembered.

And then, he remembered.

_Dorian._

 

[ ](http://fanjapanologist.tumblr.com/post/165141499333/adoribull-minibang-time-heres-my-illustrations)

 

\---

 

Bull gasped awake, blinking his eye against the train’s fluorescent runelight. The static hum of the rail lines filled his ears. A hand at his shoulder steadied him, then moved to the needle at his wrist.

“So?” Stitches said, resting a finger on the plastic butterfly wings on either side of the needle. He tugged gently at the tubing attached to it and slid the needle free.

Bull’s lips twisted. “It was a setup.”

“What?”

“Start to finish. They played us,” came Krem’s voice from beside him. Bull glanced at him as Stitches pressed gauze to Bull’s wrist. Dalish, already free, was leaning over his arm.

“The de Ghislains? Lady Vivienne?” Stitches said, then glanced quickly at the redhead still asleep across from Bull, searching her face for any flicker of consciousness.

“The Inquisition,” spat Skinner from across the aisle, curling her lip as she yanked the tubing away from herself.

“The ones dealing with that giant hole in the sky?” Stitches said. “That thing that was all over the news? With the demons appearing and everything?”

“That’s the one. The job was a ploy. There was no plot to blackmail Bastien. Leliana never had any intel on him,” said Bull. He nodded toward the lady across from him. “Vivienne was working on Leliana’s behalf.”

“What does the Inquisition want from us?” Stitches carefully pulled the needle from Leliana’s arm, his eyes darting again to her face. No movement.

“An audition,” Krem said.

“And apparently we passed,” Bull added. He rose, mindful of the sway of the train, and rolled the stiffness from his shoulders. He bent a little to glance out the window. Early evening colored the hills turquoise as they flew past, a few farms tucked here and there between them. Bull liked the Fereldan countryside. It ran cold, true, but the land was hardy, like the people, and the sea smelled of salt and not spice. Still, it was hard to ignore the swirling green maelstrom marring the center of the sky, all the brighter as the daylight faded.

“They want to hire us,” Stitches let go of Leliana’s wrist to raise an eyebrow up at Bull. “The Inquisition. They couldn’t have just used the normal channels?”

“You read her file. She seem like the type to use normal channels?” Bull craned his head carefully as he bent down and pulled a big brown duffle bag from beneath his seat.

The crackle of the speakers interrupted them. “Now approaching: Warden Memorial.”

“So what now?” Stitches said. He closed the case housing his supplies as Krem stepped around him, bag in hand.

“Stick to the plan. Krem and I get off here, the rest of you scatter through the cars and get off next stop. Head back to the inn, we’ll regroup. Krem and I apparently have a meeting in the morning.”

Krem slung his bag over his shoulder. “That’s the last time I play forger for you.”

“Until you work on your charms, yeah, it is,” said Bull, leading the way down the aisle. The train car’s seats all sat empty except for Bull’s crew and their mark.

“You wanted a salesman, and you got it,” Krem said.

“I told you suave, not constipated,” said Bull. “And what the crap was all that about ‘exotic and forbidden techniques from across the Waking Sea’?” He wiggled his fingers as he said it, feigning Krem’s accent.

“Next time, you play the smarmy pitch man at the fancy party, and I’ll be the looming bodyguard. Everyone’s happy.”

They passed through the train car door. The waiting dwarf conductor nodded to Bull and pulled down the “Closed for Maintenance” sign from the door’s window. Coins jangled in his pocket as he moved.

“You couldn’t loom if your life depended on it,” said Bull, turning back to Krem.

“Listen, just because you’re three heads taller than the rest of us doesn’t mean--”

“Now arriving at: Warden Memorial,” chimed the speaker above them.

There was a faint electric crackle as the train came to a bumpy stop. Krem grabbed at a pole near the car stairs as the train settled. The outer doors slid open to a waiting crowd.

“They need to shore up the magic in that train’s runes,” Krem muttered as they pushed their way onto the platform. He reached up to loosen his tie.

“Yeah, they’ll get to that the same day they fix the ice runes on our office AC,” said Bull.

“That’s what you get for picking the wrong dwarf,” Krem said.

“Rocky has many redeeming qualities,” Bull said, ducking beneath a hanging sign that read “Outbound: Denerim Central -- Amaranthine.” They never made the damn things high enough for Qunari.

“Let me know when you remember what they are,” Krem chuckled. They climbed a long staircase and wound their way through the station and out into the evening air. The sight of Warden Memorial Hospital greeted them from across the street, sprawling across most of the block. The rest of the town seemed scattered around its feet, built from the remains of the old Keep that once stood beyond where the hospital now sat.

“Hey, you think this is all on the level?” Krem asked as they walked. “The Inquisition?”

Bull sighed. “Don’t know. Clearly they’re not above fucking with people, but--that doesn’t mean they’re not doing what needs to be done.”

“There’s the old soldier,” said Krem. Bull shoved him lightly toward the sidewalk edge. He stumbled, laughing a little.

“Doesn’t mean it’s not true, anyway. Guess we’ll see. I can’t say I’m not open to considering anyone who’s keeping demons from falling out of the sky, if that’s really what they were,” Bull said. He curled his lip a little, shaking out his shoulders as though to shake the image away.

Krem gave a low whistle. “Yeah, that’s… something.”

The news had played the grainy videos over and over: strange, greenish lightning flashing through a churning maelstrom of cloud. In the flashes, strange shapes seemed to descend from the eye of the storm, never clear enough to name for certain, but the frantic eyewitnesses described horrifying faces, sharp claws, terrible screams. Some claimed it was the chaos of it all lengthening shadows and confusing sounds. Others said no, it was demons, they were real after all and coming for everyone. Official statements, meanwhile, only created more confusion. The Chantry talked only of the Revered Mother, lost in the fray as the sky opened up. The International Council of Wardens spoke only of rebuilding and assisting refugees, and the Inquisition said only that the investigation was ongoing. That the Inquisition had been formed to do the investigating did nothing to settle fears.

Bull pushed away the unease in his gut and clapped Krem on the shoulder. “Come on, there’s a Rivaini take out place up ahead. We can worry about this crap in the morning.”

Krem grinned. “Now you’re talking.”

 

\---

 

Morning found them back in Denerim Square, at the foot of a towering office building in the financial district. They passed through the doors and into a spacious lobby ringed with plants and stylish couches.

“How can I help you?” said a smiling elf woman seated behind the front desk, blonde hair tucked behind her ears.

“The Bull’s Chargers to see Leliana,” Bull said. The elf’s expression sobered immediately. She stood and beckoned to someone behind them, and Bull turned to see a few men dressed in military garb approaching.

“Follow me,” she said. She led the group of them to the elevators. Bull was instantly on guard.

A silent ride brought them to the top floor, where they were led to a boardroom lined on nearly all sides with glass. Transparent, easy to escape (if you wanted to take on the guards and the sixteen flights of stairs, but hey, Bull had had worse jobs), but transparency ran both ways. It was hardly neutral ground, with floors and floors of civilians working below, but maybe that was the point. Don’t try anything, and we won’t. Trust and mistrust all at once. Leliana, who stood inside the room waiting, caught Bull’s eye and gave him the slightest hint of a smirk, as if she knew what he was thinking. Fair enough.

The elf led them through the glass doors, one of the guards automatically lingering near the elevator doors. A large wooden table filled the center of the room, far less ornate than the Orlesian furniture they’d filled her dream with. Leliana was waiting near the head of the table, her crisp business suit giving her a very different air than the ball gown they’d met her in the night before. Rows of rolling black leather chairs filled the sides of the table, and in the center, an apparatus Bull knew far too well. Stitches called his the Dream Machine, a portable intravenous sleep drug dispenser the team used to join their marks in dreams.

“Sit,” Leliana said, gesturing to the chairs at her left. The doors behind them closed, their guard escort standing on either side.

“Before we begin I must be assured of your absolute discretion,” Leliana continued once they’d seated themselves at her left.

“That’s our whole business,” Bull said.

“This is not your customary business, Iron Bull,” said Leliana.

“Just Bull’s fine.”

“As you like.”

Leliana finally slipped into her chair. She waved a hand toward the apparatus on the table. “I hope you understand, we must take every precaution possible. This is not a discussion to be had in the open. I know you risk your own vulnerability, but let me put it to you this way: had we desire to harm you, you would not have made it to the stoop of this building. On the other hand, should you take our discussion somewhere it may harm our efforts afterward, it will be dealt with. Swiftly. Before you even know it’s coming.”

Bull exchanged a look with Krem, who simply arched an eyebrow in response. He turned back to Leliana and nodded once. They reached for the IV lines. Bull threaded the needle carefully into the vein at his wrist, laying his arm along the edge of the desk chair. He took a last lingering look around the room before his eye drifted closed.

The dream Leliana brought them into differed little from the boardroom of reality. The same glass encasement, the same plain, sturdy table. Only here, no guards stood near the doors, and in front of Leliana sat a spread of file folders and pictures.

“And here I was hoping for something interesting,” Bull said.

“I must leave dream architecture to the specialists, I’m afraid,” Leliana said with a quirk of her lips. “Let me get straight to the point. You understand who we are? What the Inquisition is?”

“Only what we gleaned from the news, and some rumors,” Bull said. “Begun in the wake of the Divine’s death -- despite the Chantry’s best efforts -- to combat whatever cut the hole in the sky a couple months back, which might have been some kind of Tevinter extremist group.”

“Simply put, but not untrue,” Leliana said.

“And I’m guessing we’re here because you need dream security so that group can’t get at you,” Bull said.

“While that may benefit us, no, that is not the reason you’ve been called here.” Leliana opened one of the folders in front of her. “You are here because we’ve been assured you are the very best at what you do. I have done my research, and from what I have gathered, this is true. This is a delicate matter, gentlemen, hence the need for absolute discretion. I’ll remind you again of my warning.”

“Listen, ma’am, we’re not interested in helping the world end,” Bull said. “If you researched us, then you’ll know our business. We do dream security and occasional extraction on strict terms. We don’t do big politics, and we’re not in the business of hurting people who don’t deserve it.”

“And what of helping the Inquisition?” Leliana said, looking up from her papers.

“If I’m understanding you, this isn’t a political maneuver. This is life and death,” Bull said.

“Astute. Yes,” she said. She pulled the top sheet of paper from the folder, and Bull caught a glimpse of a photograph attached to it. His own.

“So, Mr. Aclassi was not entirely untruthful in the dream. You worked in information extraction for the Qunari. Ben-Hassrath special ops, to be precise. After an incident in Alam, Seheron, you were re-assigned to Antiva, working with Fisher’s Company out of Ansberg. Then you moved on to Val-Rouyeax, where you formed your current company. Less than a year ago, you were officially but dishonorably discharged from the Ben-Hassrath and stripped of your citizenship.”

Well, shit. Strange to hear such a clipped summary of some of the worst events of his life. Strange that she would have access to it. Either Qunari cyber security was surprisingly lacking, or the Inquisition had some alarmingly skilled hackers on their side.

“If you wanted to get to know me, all you had to do was ask,” Bull said. Leliana flashed him a pointed glance, then looked back down at the next paper.

“Cremisius Aclassi, formerly Lieutenant, dishonorably discharged from the Tevinter Armed Forces for abandoning your unit, officially listed as missing in action and wanted for questioning.”

Krem shifted uncomfortably beside Bull, but said nothing. Leliana gestured to the rest of the files. “I have dossiers on your whole team. Quite impressive. Many criminals, vagrants, ex-patriots. And yet, every one of the jobs we have information on supports your claims. Exposing criminal corporations, aiding police officials, even toppling monopolies. Honor among thieves, it seems.”

Bull raised an eyebrow. “Is there a question in there?”

Leliana dropped the papers back into a pile in front of her and closed the file. “Extraction is clearly your talent. But we propose not to take information out of the mind, but to...implant an idea within the mind.”

She pushed another folder toward Bull. Inside was a series of photos of a man with a horrifically mangled face, skin stretched unnaturally over what looked like a piece of shrapnel embedded deep in the forehead.

“This is our enemy. He calls himself Corypheus. A man whose equal has not been seen for millennia. A very powerful, very ancient creature who possesses the power of magic in the way our ancestors did. Very likely, beyond even their capabilities.”

“A true mage,” Krem said, leaning forward to look over Bull’s shoulder. “Like the academics back home talk about.”

“Far more than that,” Leliana said, reaching to flip through the photos. She pulled another from the stack and put it on top. It showed the creature again, but this time with a young woman at this side. There was a brilliant ball of light erupting from his hands. Not light like the small fireballs used by the military mages now, or the ice spikes some of them could make. Raw power. Like the old stories. Bull felt a pricking at the back of his neck.

“A demon?” he said, looking up at Leliana. “An actual, real demon? So all that crap on the news really was true. Demons aren’t just stories.”

“We haven’t been able to study his nature closely, but technically speaking, he’s not a demon, not like you’re thinking,” Leliana said. “How familiar are you with Chantry teaching?”

“The basics,” Bull said. “Enough to get by. Krem probably knows more than I do.”

Leliana nodded. “We believe, and he claims, that he is one of the magisters who entered the Golden City of the Maker.”

Bull looked over at Krem in time to see his eyes go wide. He looked back at Leliana. “The ones they say created darkspawn? Started the Blights?”

“The same,” Leliana said.

“That can’t be possible,” Krem said.

“Even if he’s not what he claims, we have seen his power, and he is a true mage, or has found some way of amplifying his magic in ways we have not seen in an Age,” Leliana said.

Bull stared down at the picture. “And you want us to plant some kind of idea in his head? How are we--”

“Not him.” Leliana tapped a finger on the photo. “Her.”

She pulled out another photo from the stack. This was a closer photo of the woman at Corypheus’s side, and showed her to be even younger than she’d looked to Bull before. A pale complexion littered with freckles, and light-colored hair twisted into braids at the base of her head.

“Her name is Calpernia. No house name. A mage, by present definition, though it’s possible her power has grown under Corypheus’s influence. She is leading a group that serves him, calling themselves the Venatori. We believe she may, until recently, have been a contracted servant.”

“Clever bastard,” said Bull. “Picking a mage servant. No end of loyalty and ambition, probably.”

“Exactly so,” Leliana said. “Ambition we hope may be turned to our advantage.”

Leliana straightened in her chair. “Our proposal is this: to plant in her mind the idea to split from Corypheus, in the hope that we can divide his forces and weaken him.”

“But what you’re asking is -- it isn’t possible,” Krem said again. “Even if we could somehow get close enough to her to do this, inception doesn’t work. It’s been tried. No one has ever done it successfully.”

Bull stared down at the photo, pursing his lips. “That’s -- not entirely true.”

Bull felt Krem’s eyes on him. “What?”

Bull looked back up at Leliana. “Krem’s not wrong. It won’t be easy, or quick. There’s no alternative?”

“We continue to fight him on every front,” Leliana said. “But this is our best chance to deal a real blow.”

“Wait, Chief, are you serious? You’ve done this before?” Krem’s hand clasped Bull’s arm.

“Not me,” Bull said. “But I know it’s been done.”

“We have resources. People. We’re asking for your talent, your knowledge. We’re asking you to help us save the world,” Leliana said. “It is no small request. If you must consider--”

“How did you come up with this idea?” Bull said, the back of his neck prickling again.

“That’s classified.”

Bull leaned back, considering the picture again. “We’re not cheap.”

A thin smile spread over Leliana’s lips. “You wouldn’t be here if you were.”

“Chief--” Krem started.

Bull looked back at him, but Krem just sighed, shaking his head. “This is dangerous. I mean, _really_ dangerous.”

“Take a day,” Leliana said. “Think carefully. If you accept this offer,” she slides a slip of paper across the table, “then meet us tomorrow morning with your team and everything you will need for the foreseeable future at the address on that paper, and we will begin.”

“Not much time,” Krem remarked.

Leliana chuckled. “Mr. Aclassi, you are dreamers. You have all of the time you need. And we have no time to lose.”

Bull unfolded the piece of paper and stared at the amount written on it. He passed it to Krem.

“Sweet Andraste,” Krem said.

“Good day, gentlemen.”

 

\---

 

“Tell me again how you know this isn’t an insane plan,” said Krem the next morning, as Bull led the way down a small dirt lane. The address Leliana gave them led to a plot of farmland well outside Amaranthine and into the hills beyond. It had taken a solid hour to convince Skinner it wasn’t a murder plot just because “that’s exactly how _I’d_ do it.”

“Didn’t say it wasn’t insane,” Bull said over his shoulder, adjusting his pack strap over his arm. “Just that it wasn’t impossible.”

“Fine. What’s the story, then?” Krem said.

“I told you,” Bull said, with another glance back. “I...worked with a guy that did it once. Don’t know much about it, he didn’t like to talk about it. But the concept was--doable.” It was more or less the truth.

“That’s it?” Stitches said.

“You ‘worked’ with him, huh Chief?” Dalish snickered. “Bet that wasn’t all that was ‘doable.’”

Bull forced a laugh, keeping his face forward. He leaned into the joke. “We did all kinds of work together. He was very talented.”

As if on cue, Krem scoffed. “Ugh, spare us.”

“You asked,” said Bull. He breathed out slowly. “Anyway. Great team like us? This’ll be a piece of cake.”

“But how did he-- _whoa_.”

Krem stopped short as they came over the top of a high hill. Sitting below them, spaced wide apart, were three enormous helicopters, their blades still as they waited in a small field.

Leliana and a few Inquisition soldiers waited beside them. She smiled as the Chargers approached.

“Gentlemen,” she said. “Your chariots await.”

 

\---

 

The Breach, as the news media had taken to calling it, looked even more unsettling from the air. Out the helicopter window, Bull watched the eerie green light churn the clouds around it in slow circles.

“What really happened?” Bull asked into his headset, turning to look at Leliana. His headset bumped awkwardly against the back of his seat. They never had Qunari-grade equipment in the South.

Leliana looked back at him from her seat next to the pilot, and he gestured a thumb toward the window. She raised an eyebrow. “You said you saw the news.”

“Saw the crappy phone videos they keep replaying, sure, but--you never did answer me before. Were those really demons? Falling from the sky? Everyone’s saying something different and no one’s got a straight answer.”

Leliana turned to look out the front window. “Yes. They were. It was--terrible. Closing it was a miracle, but a temporary one.”

“Is the stuff about the Herald true?” Krem said.

“You will see for yourself soon enough,” Leliana said.

The Inquisition’s headquarters, it turned out, was what looked like an old castle built into the mountains, well-hidden by the peaks. It was only visible when they were almost directly above it, a great grey shadow against the white of the snow. He probably should’ve guessed they’d be holed up in some ancient ruin, with the way this whole job was going. He knew someone that would’ve loved this place. Well. Loved to critique the unimaginative Fereldan design and boring stonework.

Bull frowned a little. The nagging question at the back of his mind since their meeting the day before barrelled to the forefront of his mind. “Hey, now that we’re on board, mind telling us where you really heard about us?”

“We’ve many serving in the Inquisition. Your reputation wasn’t unknown,” she said. “But you came the most highly recommended by one in particular.”

“And that is?”

“Dorian Pavus.”

Bull went very, very still. His grip on his seat stayed relaxed, but it was a near thing. He kept his eyes on the Breach outside. “You could’ve told us you already had the expert.”

A short laugh sounded in his ear through the headset as he watched the clouds circle in. “I told you, it was classified. And... he wasn’t sure you’d come, if you knew.”

Bull made no reply. Dorian. The months tallied up over two years now since he’d woken to a rainy morning in Ansberg and an empty bed. Shit.

He felt Krem’s foot tap his, and he looked up. Krem raised an eyebrow and tilted his head a little, a question. Bull shook his head.

 

\---

 

They landed just below the long stone bridge that crossed a deep valley and led through the fortress’s front gate. Grim eyed the bridge with a bit of suspicion as they stepped down from the helicopters and gathered at its entrance. He looked at Bull, who shrugged. Seemed solid enough.

Waiting for them at the bridge was a woman in a dark blue suit coat and skirt over a golden, ruffled blouse. A long, elaborate, golden necklace rested over the coat’s lapels. Her dark hair had been plaited and fastened back, and she stood on frankly intimidating heels, despite the dusting of snow on the ground. She stepped forward as they approached, cradling a clipboard in one hand.

“The Iron Bull, I presume?” she said, holding out a hand. Bull took it, her fingers small and dainty in his large palm, and bowed his head. She smiled.

“I am Josephine Montilyet,” she said. “I am the Inquisition’s ambassador and chief diplomat.”

She nodded to the others, then spread an arm toward the bridge. “My aides will give your team a tour of the facilities and lead them to their rooms. I’m afraid the tour must wait for you and Mr. Aclassi, however. The Inquisitor wished to discuss the plans for your project immediately. If you’ll follow me? Leliana, you’ve been sent for as well.”

Outside appearances turned out to be a good indicator of the fortress’s interior. Scaffolding lined the walls and several buildings, no doubt an effort at repairs. The stone looked as though it had seen better days. Still, it was every inch the fairytale castle, with towers and turrets everywhere they turned. The courtyard seemed chaotic, full of tents and cargo boxes of all shapes, as well as workers running back and forth between buildings and scaffolding. The Inquisition was a young organization, but the sight of it all drove home to Bull exactly how young.

He scanned the crowd. He didn’t really expect Dorian to be among them, but he couldn’t help looking anyway. None of the faces looked familiar.

Josephine motioned them up a staircase at the courtyard’s center and into what she called the main hall, a massive room filled with more scaffolding. It stretched far back to a wall of stained glass, and the ceilings rose well above the second story. They caught only a glimpse before Josephine ushered them through a side door and down another corridor. At the end, a pair of heavy doors swung open for them, revealing a crowded war room.

And there, standing near the edge of a massive table, was Dorian. For a moment, he was the only thing Bull saw. He wore crisp black slacks and a bright purple button-down shirt, a patterned tie loosened at his neck. Bull watched his hands still mid-gesture, and noted the frayed thread at the end of his sleeve. There was a wrinkle at the very tip of his collar, turning it up just slightly. Dents in the armor. Kohl lined his eyes, mussed at the corners. It was easier to look at that than at his eyes directly, which--for the briefest of moments--softened.

Crap.

 

[ ](http://fanjapanologist.tumblr.com/post/165141499333/adoribull-minibang-time-heres-my-illustrations)

 

“Chief?” said Krem, behind him.

“Sorry, didn’t catch that,” said Bull, without looking away.

Josephine quietly cleared her throat. “I was saying, this is the Inquisitor, Sasha Adaar.”

Bull forced his eyes away from Dorian and onto the qunari standing at the table’s center, A red ridge of hair rose between two sawed off horn stumps, and she stood taller than everyone else in the room, except for Bull. Bull tipped his head to her. “Ma’am.”

“And General Cullen Rutherford, the head of our armed forces,” Josephine continued, gesturing to the blond man next to the Inquisitor.

Cullen nodded. “It’s good to meet you.”

“Likewise,” said Bull.

“And these gentlemen are spearheading our dream initiative. That is Solas, and it seems perhaps you know Dorian?”

Bull spared a nod for Solas, then looked again to Dorian. It seemed he’d had time to smooth the surprise from his face. Dorian’s own nod of greeting was directed at Krem.

“Everyone, this is the Iron Bull and Cremisius Aclassi, of the Bull’s Chargers. If you’ll both join us around the table, we were just discussing the particulars of this initiative.” Josephine rounded the table to stand in an empty spot beside Cullen. Leliana took up position next to her.

“I’ve briefed them on the salient points,” she said.

The table, which stretched nearly the whole width of the room, looked to be made from a slab of wood cut from a very old and large tree. Drawings and diagrams covered most of it. A stack of books to one side held down the rumpled corner of a sprawling map, mostly buried beneath the papers. Bull squinted at some of the drawings. Careful lines measured out what looked like a city, rising with pointed spires and falling with flat-topped office buildings into a jagged skyline--the mixed modern and ancient architecture of Minrathous. Branching from certain lines, he recognized the spiky but elegant jut of Dorian’s handwriting.

“Perhaps it would be best to start from the beginning,” said Solas. An elf, and from the look of the pale green tunic he wore, Bull might have guessed Dalish. His face, however, was as bare as his head.

“As some of you know, when the Breach opened, there was a power surge of sorts that spread through the immediate area. A burst of magic, essentially, that seemed to temporarily accelerate magic abilities beyond what’s been seen in over an Age,” Solas said. He gestured now and again as he spoke, as if he might spread a likeness of the Breach in the air before them. Bull frowned. They’d definitely been keeping that development under wraps.

“Not to mention the demons that came pouring from the sky along with it,” said Dorian.

“Hard to miss,” said Bull.

Solas nodded. “Yes, indeed, and we do believe there’s a connection. Scholarly research shows that historically, demons have always been attracted to weak points or outright tears in the Veil between this world and the Fade. And that is exactly what the Breach was--something that opened our world to the Fade in a way it has not been for an age. Though we sealed it temporarily, we are still seeing effects on mages, and those effects are spreading. If historical record is to be believed, mages of the Dragon Age and beyond were capable of magic far more potent and varied than what we’ve seen in modern times. Some even claim abilities extended to shapeshifting or animating the dead.”

“All right, what does that have to do with the dream inception plan?” Cullen asked.

“I’m merely ensuring we all understand the gravity of the situation. Our new friends may not know as much as the rest of us,” Solas said, with a glance at Cullen.

“Please continue.” The Inquisitor waved a hand.

“We cannot know how far Corypheus will go with this power. He could very well raise an army of demons if he’s as powerful as he claims. Certainly an access to the Fade like he was seeking would give him that power. He must be stopped,” said Solas.

“What exactly is his goal?” Bull asked.

“From what we can gather, power over the entire world,” said Leliana.

“He has delusions of godhood,” Dorian added. “And the frightening thing is that he may be powerful enough to succeed at it.”

“Therefore we propose to weaken him enough that we might find an advantage. Fracture his enclave,” Solas said. “We will subconsciously convince one of his inner circle to betray him.”

“With inception,” said Bull.

“Precisely.”

“How?” Krem asked. “Bull’s told me it can be done, but inception is still incredibly difficult. The mind can always trace the origin of an idea, especially if it’s not organic.”

“Not if you plant it deep enough,” said Dorian. Bull looked to him, and he looked briefly to Bull. His expression did not change, but the flicker in his eyes was enough.

Solas reached for a poster-size blueprint rolled up in one corner of the table. “Our proposal is this: to plant the idea in stages, masking its evolution in the mind.”

“If we want Calpernia to ultimately choose to dissolve her partnership with Corypheus, we must find a weak enough point in that partnership to strike. This is where we’ll be relying on Leliana’s team. We’ll need to know everything we can about Calpernia. Where is she from, how did she live before now, what brought her to Corypheus, what keeps her there? What is her goal, and what did he promise her? What does she care about most? Anything and everything we can uncover. No stone unturned.” Dorian leaned forward over the table as he spoke.

“From there,” said Solas, “we create a dream in levels, using each level to evolve the idea in her mind.”

“Multiple level dreams are risky,” said Krem. “Often unstable.”

“That’s why you’re here,” said Dorian, with a flick of his eyebrows. “This is, after all, the Chargers’ speciality, is it not?”

“We’ll talk to Stitches,” Bull said. “Our chemist. He’ll see about the kind of sleep we need for this.”

“We’ll need to find a way to get to her,” said Cullen. “And once we do, a way to keep her under for enough time.”

“Then we await Leliana’s success, and go from there,” Dorian said. “We can plan once we know her movements. And the more information we find, the better Solas can craft the dream state.”

Bull’s brow furrowed. Solas? Bull knew nothing of the man’s skill, but he knew everything about Dorian’s. I’m a Pavus, he said once, long, long ago, near their first meeting, a sharp grin on his lips. He’d spread his arms dramatically. I’m Tevinter’s elite, descended from the first Dreamers that bent the Fade to their will. The greatest of any in Thedas at dream architecture by right of blood. It sounded practiced, and more than a little sarcastic, but bold. He was often bold back then. Not demanding, but with an air of entitlement. On the surface, at least. The grief had yet to bow his shoulders completely. He held only a shadow of that swagger now, a play at the old confidence, a ruse clear to Bull’s eye only. Two years stretched very long, it seemed.

Bull remembered Dorian’s dream-crafting. Tevinter taste, decidedly, in the curves and bends of the buildings, the flourishes of the streets, the old plazas. His weakness for seaside dreams, implausible oceans that ringed utopian islands, with shells washing ashore painted impossible colors. Dorian could create anything.

And he wasn’t.

Bull shook himself from his thoughts when he looked to Dorian again only to find him gone. Solas was gathering up the drawings on the table. Josephine was circling around again to approach Bull and Krem.

“Shall I show you to your rooms?”

 

\---

 

Krem just rolled his eyes when Bull asked Josephine where he might find Dorian. He leaned on the doorframe of Bull’s new room with his arms folded, saying nothing, but giving Bull a look.

“What?” said Bull, setting his pack down in the corner.

“That was him, wasn’t it? The guy you ‘worked’ with,” Krem said. Bull nodded.

“You didn’t mention he was a Tevinter altus.”

“Didn’t see the relevance,” Bull said. “Problem?”

Krem held up his hands. “Do what you want. Who you want, even. But don’t think I didn’t see how you looked at him when you walked in the war room.”

Bull sighed. “Listen, we had a thing once, a good thing. He had to end it. Had some personal crap going on. That’s all there is to it.”

“If you say so,” Krem said. “I just know men like him, Chief. They’re trouble. And you are too drawn to trouble for your own good.”

“And you call me the team mom,” Bull said. Krem just shook his head and moved back down the hall to his own room.

Josephine’s directions led Bull to a sizeable, open rotunda off of the main hall. From the ground floor, Bull could look all the way to the top, where he could see the soft glow of what looked like crystal projectors reflecting on the ceiling. The room at the rotunda’s base held a small desk where Solas sat sketching, half-finished paintings covering the wall behind him. Solas glanced up as Bull entered and spared him a nod. Before Bull could say anything in reply, he caught a familiar flash of black hair over the top of the railing on the floor above. Bull's chest tightened. Solas had already returned to his sketches, and said nothing as Bull moved to the staircase. When Dorian came into view at the top, Bull found himself unable to do much more than stare.

“Oh, marvelous, I wasn’t already having a terrible day,” Dorian said, when he caught sight of Bull. He straightened, folding his arms across his chest. “Let’s have it out, then. I’m an inconsiderate arse and an arrogant little shit, and I’m sure you’re halfway to slamming those meaty fists into my jaw. Just be quick about it, if you please. I’ve rather a lot to do and an ever-shortening amount of time to do it in.”

“Wasn’t my first thought for a reunion, but if that’s what you’re into,” Bull said, a little taken aback. He leaned his shoulder against the wall. He tried to find the rhythm of their rapport, but his heart wasn’t in it. The steps had changed. “I could use a good spar.”

“Well, perhaps one of your team is looking for entertainment,” Dorian said. “Some of us have work to do. So if you’re not here to berate or beat me, I’ve plenty of books that are lining up to do the job--”

“That’s it?” Bull said.

“There we are,” Dorian dropped his arms. “Let it out, then.”

Bull’s eye narrowed. “Why am I here, Dorian?”

“Why are you here? Because apparently the only viable means of saving the world from certain doom happens to be the thing you are the most talented in. Congratulations.”

“That’s not what I’m asking,” Bull ventured a step closer.

Dorian’s jaw tightened. “They asked for the best. It’s hardly my fault if that’s you. I tried to keep you out of it, in fact. I’ve always tried to--”

He looked quickly away, fingers curling tightly together at his sides. “Look, if there were any other alternative, I wouldn’t be here, and neither would you. I never asked to be a dashing hero but such is the inevitable fate of men with my profile and knowledge of theoretical subconscious thaumaturgy. Now, I’m asking nicely if you would please--”

“Dorian--”

“Don’t,” Dorian snapped, his eyes suddenly bright and wild as they whip back to Bull’s face. Bull’s hand, halfway lifted toward him, dropped. He pursed his lips, nodded once, and turned.

He paused when he reached the stairs. Without turning his head, he said, “I told you on the very first night that there were no obligations. You did what you needed to do. Wasn’t here to argue with that. Just wanted to see you. That was all.”

He was proud, in the end, that he made it all the way down the stairs without looking back.

 

[ ](http://fanjapanologist.tumblr.com/post/165141499333/adoribull-minibang-time-heres-my-illustrations)

 

* * *

 

Dorian couldn’t sleep that night. He kicked the covers away feeling tangled and hot, and stared stubbornly at the ceiling, refusing to close his eyes. Every time he did, he saw the Bull.

How many months had he spent imagining, trying to repaint Bull in his mind? Trying to recreate the shape of his chest with a pillow, trying to remember the sound of his voice? And then there he was in the doorway, tall and broad and so different from what Dorian remembered. The tail end of a scar he didn’t recognize jutted across Bull’s forearm beneath a rolled up sleeve. Another clawed down the side of his face, half-covered by an eyepatch. An eye was missing. He’d lost a fucking _eye_. Everywhere, there were hints of a hundred stories Dorian had missed.

He had been so sure Bull would be angry. So sure, in fact, he’d been prepared when he suggested the Chargers to the Inquisition for Bull to refuse to see him. So sure, that when Bull appeared in the library, Dorian did what he always did and went in spines out, fists swinging, ready for the pain. What else had been supposed to say? Dorian deserved whatever Bull wanted to throw at him. What was he supposed to do when that ended up being gentleness? He thought of the hurt that flickered across Bull’s face as he turned away. The exact look he tried never to imagine when he pictured Bull as he left him, sleeping peacefully in their room, unaware of the empty bed that would await him when he woke.

Well. Perhaps it didn’t matter. Bull surely wouldn’t want to speak to him again, after that wretched display. Keep it professional, Dorian told himself. Forget the past and get the work done. He rolled onto his side, wrapping his arms around his pillow. Forget the past. Because that had never given him trouble before.

It was a long time before he fell asleep.

 

\---

 

He dreamt of the sound of the sea drifting in on the breeze through the open windows of a familiar hotel room.The curtains twirled lazily to the rhythm. It was always the sound of the sea Dorian remembered, before and after. It had been soothing, once. It sounded now like the shouting of some angry crowd gathering on the street below.

Dorian stepped carefully onto the soft carpet. Outside, the sky was dark, and the sea dark with it, the white spray of the surf barely visible in the distance. Inside, the room was lit with candles, and they softened the stark white decor. White couches surrounded a white marble coffee table, the candlelight catching on the gold trim. White linens, smoothly folded up underneath plush pillows, covered a broad bed lined on either side by marble side tables. It was so unlike the usual Tevinter flare for sharp shapes and sharper, darker colors, and that was why Rilienus had always loved coming there. That, and falling asleep to the sound of the Waking Sea.

Dorian sat himself down on the couch, eyeing the familiar figure that stood at one of the windows in front of the bed. He was just as Dorian remembered him: black, unruly curls brushing his ears and eyes just as dark, arms that showed just a hint of muscle under the soft brown skin, jaw carefully shaved smooth. He still made Dorian’s breath catch. He turned and smiled as Dorian sat, going to the bed and pulling on a silk robe that had been left draped over the quilt.

“At last, my love,” he said. “You’ve kept me waiting.”

He leaned down, bracing a hand on Dorian’s shoulder and gently kissing him. Dorian, in spite of himself, lifted his chin to meet Rilienus’s lips. Rilienus smiled again, seating himself next to Dorian on the couch.

“You’ll stay, won’t you?” he said. “I’ll make this a night you’ll never forget.” He slid a hand up Dorian’s leg. “I’ll make every night--” he nuzzled at Dorian’s ear, “--just like this--”

Dorian pursed his lips and dropped a hand on top of Rilienus’s, stopping him.

“You know I can’t do that,” Dorian said, voice hoarse as he leaned away from Rilienus’s lips.

Rilienus pulled back, frowning. “Why? You promised.”

“I know,” Dorian said, holding Rilienus’s hand in both of his. “I know, but I--”

“You _promised_ ,” Rilienus said, louder. “You said we’d always be together. You said we’d share everything.”

Dorian slid back on the couch. “Rilienus--”

“You’re going to leave me here? After _everything_? Leave me for _him_?”

His dark eyes went wide. His face twisted with anger, and he bared his teeth.

Dorian scrambled to his feet. “Rilienus, please, I--”

Rilienus let out a scream of rage. Dorian bolted for the door, dodging around an end table, Rilienus fast on his heels. Dorian pulled the heavy door open and ran down the hall until he reached the elevator. He pressed frantically at the rune to open the door, looking back as he did to find Rilienus had nearly reached him. As the door opened behind him, Dorian threw up a barrier that stopped Rilienus with his hands raised. Dorian pushed the barrier out hard as he tumbled backwards into the elevator, sending Rilienus flying. He crashed to the floor with a groan. Dorian reached up quickly to press another button. Rilienus glared up at him from the floor as the doors slid closed between them.

“I’m sorry,” Dorian whispered.

He woke gasping for breath. He sat up, pressing a hand to his chest, the covers dropping to his waist as he panted. He reached back blindly on the side table until his fingers collided with a small hourglass perched near the edge. He grabbed it and flipped it, holding it up at eye level to watch the sand tumble toward the bottom. His hands shook, but he stared at it until he was sure the sand was actually accumulating in the base, then set it back on the side table. He ran a hand through his hair, still trying to catch his breath.

After a moment he lifted his head and looked around the room. No white couches or marble tables greeted him, no expensive wallpaper. Only the heavy grey stone of Skyhold, and thick, purple draperies framing a single dirty window. His bed was small, and cradled in a simple wooden frame that creaked every time Dorian moved. His suitcase lay open on an old wooden chair, shirts and ties strewn haphazardly over the top.

Dorian sighed, squinting at the sunlight coming in through the window. He pulled the covers back and swung his legs over the side.

 

\---

 

“Ah, there you are.”

Dorian drew a sharp breath in through his nose and tensed. He’d been leaning over some thick book of Fade diagrams he’d rescued from a bottom shelf a few alcoves over, trying to make his mind focus on them. He quickly scrubbed a hand beneath his eyes and fixed a smile to his lips before turning on his heel. Josephine stood at the top of the stairs, arms laden with several huge tomes, Solas at her side.

“A bad time?” she asked, craning her head to see around the stack.

“For you, my lady? Never,” he said, moving quickly to her other side. He gave Solas a terse nod. Josephine deposited the books into his arms.

“Save the charm for the next favor you ask, Lord Pavus. That should be every one, including the Redwin,” she said, tapping the spine of one of the books with a purple nail. “I took the liberty of informing Solas of their arrival. They seemed of interest to both of you.”

Dorian carried them to his table, pushing a pile of papers out of the way. He felt no need to correct her on his title, and leaned down instead to scan the words printed along the sides of the books. Satisfied, he straightened and grinned.

“My dear Josephine, you are nothing short of a miracle worker,” he said.

“Yes, I am,” she said with a quirk of her lips. “And as we agreed, I’ll expect your prompt and very heartfelt gratitude.”

“For this? I’d gladly give you several vital organs if you asked,” Dorian said.

“I’ll take that under advisement,” she said, raising her eyebrows.

“I can’t imagine she’ll get much use out of them, with the number of empty wine bottles you leave like a trail through the library,” Solas said. Dorian raised his chin, his nostrils flaring.

Solas smiled in return. “Nonetheless, that Redwin alone may be worth the loss.”

“You clearly have much to discuss. I’ll leave you to it.” Josephine bowed her head once, and took a few steps toward the stairs before pausing to glance back over her shoulder. “And Dorian?”

“My lady?”

“ _Prompt_ ,” she said, with a look.

He bowed to her. Her sharp heels clicked loud enough on the stairs that he wondered how he’d missed her approach. Shaking his head, he turned quickly to the books, scanning their titles again. He pulled one from the center of the stack, the one that was about to cost him dearly in foreign chocolate: _Sojourns Beyond the Veil_ by Redwin the Fade-Strider.

“I hadn’t thought you particularly interested in Fade theory,” Solas said, rounding the side of the table.

“I wasn’t, up until the sky began vomiting demons on us all,” Dorian said. The book’s spine cracked as Dorian opened the cover, flipping to the index and dragging a finger along the page.

“Lovely image,” Solas said.

They’d been working together reluctantly on this dream project since Dorian first came up with the idea. Solas called himself a travelling researcher, specializing, conveniently, in Fade theory and ancient magic. He delighted in prattling on to anyone who would listen about how ancient magic used to work and what grand stories of spirits he’d collected. How he made a living for himself Dorian hadn’t the slightest clue, but Dorian’s own wanderings from Circle to Circle and library to library in the South since leaving Tevinter and Antiva hardly put him in a position to question it. Solas was--knowledgeable, Dorian could admit that, with a few useful skills. Nothing that rivaled Dorian himself. But Dorian’s fields of study focused specifically on dream architecture, and little on the Fade besides, so he was forced to concede that Solas’s research had its uses. Maybe moreso now.

“You ascribed, I assumed, to the Metaphor Theory?” said Solas as Dorian began carding through the book’s pages.

Dorian glanced up. “I hardly gave it a thought before a few months ago, but it always seemed the most plausible. The last mention of a demon in any kind of credible historical document was centuries old, just past the end of the Dragon Age.”

“And that makes it more likely that they never existed?” Solas said.

Dorian sighed, straightening. “I assume you’re going to tell me that you always knew better than the rest of us that they were real?”

Solas narrowed his eyes. “I knew better than to assume all historical accounts were fairy tales.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“That is the crux of the theory, is it not? Demons as metaphors for something else entirely?”

“If it’s so terribly important, I was actually more swayed by the linguistic argument.”

“That the term ‘demon’ actually referred to some sort of magical affliction, and catching it made you an ‘abomination’?” Solas said, sounding unimpressed.

“It wouldn’t be the first superstitious explanation touted by the Chantry for some more mundane situation,” Dorian said. Solas’s skepticism flickered away for a moment as he gave a sort of half nod of concession.

Demons had been a favored topic of debate a decade or so before Dorian entered the Circle, and some students still resurrected the argument now and again for easy assignments. Dorian rarely paid close attention when the discussion came up. The question was interesting, but ultimately useless. The truth was left far in the past, unreachable.

The joke was, of course, on him.

“The point is moot now, regardless,” Dorian said. “Clearly, my enlightened friend, you were on the right side of thinking all along.”

“It doesn’t take enlightenment to find credibility in repeatedly similar accounts of history,” said Solas.

In truth, Dorian’s thoughts had begun to shift even before the Breach sent creatures of legend clawing into the present. It was his own problems that sent him seeking these books, not the Breach, but it was far easier to mask it as professional research.

A couple years ago, his dreams had begun to--change. To bleed into the dreams he built, then into the ones he simply shared, until it wasn’t just a mesh of worlds. Until he couldn’t keep writing it off as some specter of grief. It was a presence. One single presence, following him, haunting him every moment he spent asleep, and looking every inch like the greatest loss of his life. The man he was accused of murdering.

Rilienus.

Tevinter ex-pats were not exactly a welcome fixture at Southern Circles, and more often than not, his accent gave him away if his clothing didn’t. To say finding information was difficult, even before he began to ponder the question of demons, was an understatement. Handling this little problem on top of trying to find ways to scrape coin together and somewhere to sleep at night complicated matters as well. He’d become quite familiar with the Fereldan wilderness and the Orlesian back alleys, when he couldn’t charm his way into temporary jobs at the Circle or in the towns he passed through. Stumbling into the good graces of the Inquisition hadn’t exactly been his next plan, but it certainly helped. At least something good came out of turning in his former mentor and losing yet another bit of home, though he still wasn’t sure how many of them believed his claim of innocence. The Inquisitor, at least, seemed convinced. Or it just didn’t outweigh the benefit of his talents. It wouldn’t be the first time.

“It’s wise of you, anyway, to seek out these accounts now,” Solas said, pulling Dorian’s attention back to the book. “The Redwin particularly. His writings are fascinating, and among the few genuine chronicles of journeys into the Fade, according to some. Chronicles that aren’t written by or about magisters, that is.”

“Oh, how deeply insulted I am, however shall I recover,” Dorian muttered. Solas ignored him.

“There is no telling what we may encounter, attempting what we are,” Solas said.

“This is not a new field of work,” said Dorian.

“Of course not. But the Breach has changed many things. Magic is stronger than it has been in a long time, and strong magic has always attracted attention in the past. Demons were called back into the world, or given the means to reach it. This may change dream work as we know it completely,” Solas said.

“A--fair point,” Dorian said.

“Is that not why you requested the books?”

Dorian hesitated. “It’s a factor, certainly.”

Dorian had searched months for these books, as his dreams grew worse. Every Circle and library that didn’t turn him away. He had no way of asking Tevinter libraries, and refused to call the few friends he still had there. Helping him while the warrant for his arrest was still active would put them at risk, and that was not an option. Outside of Tevinter, he’d found that ancient accounts of the Fade were rare, many of them lost over the years as popular academic sentiment swayed toward the Metaphor Theory. Their value as literature seemed not to spare them from relegation to storage closets, as the study of the Fade fell out of fashion almost entirely. He wondered how many of those academics went scrambling into their dusty Circle basements after the Breach.

Solas was smirking at him now, apparently taking his hesitance for pride. “You can admit your knowledge has limits, Lord Pavus.”

Dorian winced at the name. “Very well, I am not all-knowledgeable and all-powerful, despite any evidence to the contrary. Now you.”

Solas rolled his eyes. He picked up another book from the top of the stack and began to page through it. Dorian squinted at him a little in thought.

“I’m curious, Solas. How would you handle a demon?”

Solas didn’t even glance up. “Killing it seems prudent.”

“Just kill it on sight?”

Solas straightened, seeming to sense the opportunity for a lecture. Dorian crossed his arms.

“Tangling with demons is dangerous. That is universally clear in every account we have. Research largely suggests that demons are spirits turned, one way or another, from their original purpose. Corrupted, essentially.”

“There’s no way of changing them back?” Dorian said, curious in spite of himself.

“Stories are limited. The easiest answer seems to be that it may not be impossible, but it’s exceedingly difficult, and possibly foolhardy, especially with the stronger ones. Some will attack on sight. Many will try to bend your will, tempt you and beguile you with promises, so that they may in turn bend you to _their_ will and use you as they like.”

“What, controlling your mind?”

“More than that. Your body. There are many, many accounts of demonic possession resulting in abominations. And I think we may now safely say that was not a matter of _linguistics_ ,” Solas said with a pointedly raise eyebrow

“Why do they want a body?” said Dorian.

“The Fade is supposed to be where we go when we dream, and therefore our minds are open to spirits, who see our world as we bring it to them in our minds. They long to be part of it.”

“Seems strange, to want to leave a powerful land of magic for somewhere like this,” said Dorian, looking down at the books.

“Think of it differently. Our world seems mundane to us because it is what we see all the time, and the Fade seems exotic and interesting. For spirits, it is the opposite. But they are, according to legend, separated from our world by the Veil, and besides any spots of weakness in that Veil, mortal mages are their only means of entering. And they cannot enter into mortals without permission, so they tempt, and intimidate, and even beg, often coming to mages at their weakest,” Solas said. He looked back down at the book he held and turned a few pages. “Here. ‘Demons are drawn to emotions because they are, in the end, exceedingly simple in nature, if complex in power. They are drawn, and called, to the traits in us that mirror their very nature, and it is these that make us vulnerable to their temptation.’”

Dorian went still. “I...see.”

Solas closed the book and gestured with it toward the Redwin. “The account you opened that to is similar.”

“Is it,” Dorian said, running a hand down the page.

“Redwin finds himself in a beautiful garden, like the one his mother planted when he was a boy. He meets her there, appearing as she did when he last remembers seeing her, and she insists on taking him to share a meal with her. He almost believes her, though she died years ago, until she makes one subtle mistake. She mentions cooking the meal for him, and he had never known her to cook. The vision begins to crumble, and he sees her for what she is, a desire demon,” Solas said. “Demons are tricky, and dangerous, if these accounts are taken as truth. They draw from our thoughts like one draws from a well, and we can lose our reality if we are not careful.”

Dorian swallowed heavily. He pulled the book shut hard enough that Solas jumped.

“Yes, well, good to know. I’ve an appointment with Commander Cullen I must keep. Look through these as you like but make sure I have them back in one piece.”

Solas frowned, but said only, “No harm will come to them.”

Dorian nodded. He plucked a leather journal from the corner of the table and walked past several shelves until he reached a heavy wooden door leading out the side of the rotunda. He pushed it open, and followed the fortress wall past Cullen’s office toward one of the crumbling towers on the wall’s far side.

 

\---

 

Sunset warmed the sky as Dorian leaned his arms over the stone railing at the top of the tower, still clutching his sketchbook. The leather cover was heavily worn and scratched. The ends of the cord wrapped around it to bind it shut fluttered in the wind. After a few moments of hesitation, he reached for the cord, unraveling it and flipping the sketchbook open to a page near the front. Rilienus’s face smiled up at him from the paper, carefully shaded. The familiar line of his jaw, the soft, dark curls of his hair, all gently smudged by Dorian’s fingers. He held tight to the page as another gust of wind sailed by. He forced himself to look into Rilienus’s eyes.

Several moments passed before he managed to whisper, “Demon.”

He tightened his grip on the book, and when he drew another breath, there was a hitch. “Demon,” he said again, louder. His eyes began to sting.

“Demon. He’s a demon. He’s a fucking--”

His breath caught. He squeezed his eyes shut, his fingers shaking where they clutched at the pages. Then he cried out, turning and throwing the book across the tower floor. He slid slowly down the stone, out of the reach of the red sunlight, tears wetting his cheeks. He pressed a clenched fist to his lips.

“He’s dead,” Dorian breathed against his fingers. “There’s nothing left. It isn’t real. _Vishante kaffas_ , you fool, it isn’t real.”

But it had felt real. The first time he dreamt of Rilienus after it happened, he felt warm in Dorian’s arms. His hair tickled Dorian’s nose, the sun kissed their faces, and his laughter rang sweet and clear in Dorian’s ears. And then Dorian woke, alone in the dark of the tiny tavern room he’d managed to scrounge up enough coin for. It never stopped feeling real, every dream since.

Until he began to appear in more than just Dorian’s dreams.

 

[ ](http://fanjapanologist.tumblr.com/post/165141499333/adoribull-minibang-time-heres-my-illustrations)

 

Dorian opened his eyes. He swiped at his cheeks with his hand, his rings dragging against his skin. He was working with Fisher’s Company then, in Antiva. With Bull. He leaned his head back against the stone, staring at the square of light cutting across the corner of the floor.

What must Bull think? What would he think if he saw the words Dorian read today? Dorian, haunted by a demon. Dorian, who fled his bed and left him behind. Protecting him more than Dorian himself understood.

Dorian thought at first that it was grief. The loss that ached too strong if he stopped to name it was making him see things in the shadows. A flash of hair. A whiff of cologne. A face in the crowd, gone before he could be sure. He was distracted, surely. Mourning, still. It would pass.

Then the visions grew solid. Vivid. In his own dreams, Rilienus began to speak to him.

“I miss you, my love,” he whispered, lips brushing the shell of Dorian’s ear. “Stay with me.”

His voice was gentle, sweet. But he grew louder. Bolder. Not simply the flash of a face in passing. When Dorian followed his team through a dream's city streets, Rilienus sat on a bench they passed, or leaned in a doorway. He followed Dorian through shipyards and department stores and hotels. Anywhere the dreams took them, Rilienus appeared.

Dorian scrambled for answers. Was he hallucinating? Was his mind breaking? Was it some kind of strange projection? Taking him on had been enough of a risk on Fisher's part that he didn't dare try asking anyone outright, but that left him with little recourse.

Finally, Rilienus grew dangerous. Dorian entered a dream with the others, another Antivan cityscape. They walked the streets as tourists, seeking a mark, Thorn, the elf that had become Fisher's second in command, at the front, Dorian at the back. As they passed into a more central part of the city, Rilienus emerged from an alleyway in front of them. He attacked Thorn, lunging at him the moment he stepped close enough and jamming a knife into his gut. Dorian watched, wide-eyed and frozen, as Thorn coughed and slumped, and Rilienus tossed him to the ground. The others launched into action around Dorian, believing the dream was collapsing, and so making it collapse. Rilienus held Dorian’s gaze all the while, stepping over Thorn’s body and through the crowd to reach him.

“I won’t let anything keep us apart,” he said, low and calm. “Come back to me. I will keep coming back to you.”

Dorian left Antiva that night.

He shook himself from his thoughts, blinking the memory away. The sun sat low in the sky now, its light rapidly fading. Dorian ran his hands over his face.

 _Think of that_ , he told himself. _Think of what made you leave._

He pushed himself slowly to his feet, the wind hitting his face again. He crossed to the other side of the tower. His sketchbook lay face down on the floor, split open to the middle. He bent to retrieve it, turning it over. He was met this time with the face of the Iron Bull. Two intact eyes, cinched at the corners, horns spread beyond the borders of the page, a small grin quirking his lips. Dorian stared for a moment at the scars smudged across the Bull’s neck. Then he sighed, closing the book and tying the cord around it.

 _Think of that_.

 

\---

 

A few days passed before word arrived from Leliana’s people, and even that seemed remarkably fast. Images came in crystal messages, encrypted with illusion magic to make them appear different to anyone intercepting them. Encrypted audiograms followed, quick lists of information with promises of documents to come, sent the old-fashioned way.

Leliana played the messages at the war table, the room packed with a few of Bull’s team members, Solas, Dorian, and the Inquisitor’s advisors, along with the Inquisitor herself, who stood head and shoulders above everyone except Bull. Somehow, the only spot free when Dorian had arrived had been right next to Bull, which seemed to summarize perfectly the kind of week he was having. He tried to keep his eyes on the center of the table.

The first image that projected from Leliana’s crystal receiver was all too familiar to Dorian. A Writ of Service. Several people to Dorian’s left, one of Bull’s elven team members let out a noise of disgust and wrinkled her nose, scowling. Bull himself shifted a little, a subtle movement of his shoulders that drew Dorian’s eyes like a magnet.

“So she’s contracted. Or was. To Magister...Erasthenes?” said Krem, and Dorian wondered how he’d missed the Tevinter colors to the accent before.

“She was a fucking slave,” said the elf that had reacted before.

Slavery colored the whole of Tevinter’s history, broken up now and again by a brief few years of revolution.Those years only ever served to drive the slavers underground and further down the ratholes of Thedas, where there was never a shortage of people no one was going to miss. The last of these revolutions came at the tail end of the Dragon Age, and brought with it what was touted as the perfect solution--the Writ of Service. Servants, by law, would require payment of a living wage and respect as people, not as property. Abuse would be met with swift punishment, and contracts would be signed to show a consenting agreement between both parties. In theory. The law, conveniently or ignorantly, left wide loopholes. It gave no protection from, say, parents or other family members contracting out their children. Contracts made under duress were theoretically illegal and realistically widely unchecked.

Dorian had preferred for a long time not to look at it too closely. It seemed another in a long list of things that needed change in his homeland, and Dorian had--well, what he thought were better things to worry about, back then. He said nothing now.

Leliana passed a hand over the crystal. The tinny sound of an audiogram began to play a woman’s voice. “Calpernia developing magic changed the terms of her contract under Tevinter law. Rumor says her talents were considerable. I managed to track down one of the house servants from her time there. He claims a great hooded figure came to the door one day out of nowhere, asking for her. She disappeared not long after, only to reappear in Corypheus’s service.”

Inquisitor Adaar rubbed her chin, looking pensive. “So, Corypheus freed her of a servant’s life. Safe, I think, to say he made her promises of power.”

“Elevated her, certainly,” said Cullen. “This may be even more difficult than we thought.”

“There is more,” Leliana said, moving her finger again over the crystal’s surface.

There was a sound like cloth ruffling, and then a voice, deep and roughened, like a distant roll of thunder.

“The time nears. Tell me of your preparations.”

Another voice, a woman’s, followed. “They go well enough. But I am hampered, limited. If you would let me--”

“You are not ready. Continue as you are. Or would you have the Imperium’s rebirth stalled by your lack of focus?”

A pause, and another rustle of cloth. “I will be ready. As the Vessel, and Tevinter’s Champion.”

“See that you are.”

The sounds of movement. After a moment, there was a muttered, “Another deflection.If he would just--never mind.”

The crystal fell silent.

“Now we’re getting somewhere,” said Bull.

“I thought the same,” Leliana said. “If there’s any vulnerable place to strike, it’s there.”

“But how do we get our foot in the door? Just because there’s tension doesn’t mean she’ll embrace the idea of turning on him,” said Cullen.

“Well of course not, if you’re planning on breaking down the door of her psyche with a battering ram,” Dorian said, leaning his hands on the table.

“The suggestion must be subtle and gradual, in order for the dreamer’s mind to accept it,” said Solas, with a look Dorian’s way.

Dorian ignored him. “Planting the idea directly is impossible, as young Cremisius pointed out at our last meeting. The dreamer will recognize the origin, and the dream will collapse. That’s why I’ve proposed a three level dream state.”

Pointing out the proposal was his idea was a little petty, but yielding control of the dream’s design had been hard enough when he and Solas had initially begun crafting their plan. Dorian’s reasoning had been thin--“I’m out of practice, I’d rather focus my efforts on shaping the idea”--and, for better and for worse, Solas was all too pleased to be given the independence and did not even question him. Still, it stung to watch his initial sketches swept into a pile and shoved to the corner of Solas’s desk.

“So what does a multiple level dream mean, exactly?” said the Inquisitor, drawing Dorian out of his thoughts.

“It’s actually a Qunari tactic,” Bull said, with an unreadable glance at Dorian. Dorian pretended to be focusing intently on his notes.

Bull continued, “We stick generally to two level dreams. Like Krem said before, the more levels a dream has, the more unstable it can become. But the general idea is ‘a dream within a dream.’”

“The tactic you used on me,” Leliana said, making Dorian finally look up.

“Exactly. It uses dream logic to its advantage. Most of the time, you don’t remember how a dream began, or how you got into the middle of the story of the dream. So you forget entering the first dream, and it then acts as a barrier to reality. If the second dream collapses, most of the time the subject believes the first dream is reality.”

“Making it ideal for the process of inception. If the subject invests in at least one of these dreams as reality, then the idea we use that ‘reality’ to plant stands a stronger chance of taking root,” Dorian said, unbuttoning his sleeves and beginning to roll them up his forearms.

“But why three levels, then?” asked Adaar.

“As Solas astutely pointed out,” Dorian said quickly, just as Solas began to open his mouth, “planting the idea must be a gradual process. Feeding it to Calpernia’s mind in pieces will make the process of accepting it easier. Each level of the dream state will work toward this, introducing a bit at a time.”

“That sounds more like complicating the process with three ideas over one,” Cullen said.

“No, he’s right,” said Bull, unknowingly cutting Dorian off before his rant about who _exactly_ was the dream expert here could commence. Bull’s agreement brought him up short, and finally drew Dorian’s gaze to him.

Bull glanced up at the paused image of Calpernia, tinted the subtle purple of the crystal projecting it. “If Corypheus freed her from servitude, her loyalty is going to be pretty solid. Even if there are cracks in the granite, it’s still going to take a heavy hammer to split it.”

“And there is no heavier-hitting hammer in the mind than doubt,” said Dorian. Rilienus’s face came to him unbidden. He took a breath, willing it away as he continued, “So the first thing we have to do is introduce stronger doubt of Corypheus.”

“And maybe a sense of responsibility,” Bull said, turning his head a little to the side in thought. “Like, ‘I owe it to myself to reconsider this.’”

Dorian folded his arms and pressed the side of his index finger to his lips in thought. “Or possibly a sense of responsibility for others? Bring her face-to-face with what she came from?”

“Might backfire,” said Bull. “When survival is what drives you, you don’t always have room to care what happens to anyone else. We’d need a better idea of her personality to know--”

“Then take it another direction. Show her that other slaves are being taken by the Venatori. The Inquisition has reports of it, I believe?”

“Even if they don’t, she just needs to believe they do,” said Bull.

“But real evidence will reinforce the idea when she wakes.” Dorian turned back to him.

“True. That--could work, assuming she doesn’t already know and not care,” Bull said.

“We make it personal. Maybe that friend mentioned on the recording. Maybe dig deeper,” said Dorian.

Bull nodded. “Good. So we weaken Corypheus’s credibility with the first level, then the second level should push her toward independence.”

“‘I can accomplish my goals better without him,’” Dorian said.

“Play up how he’s holding her back.”

“And using her. Keeping the best of her power for his own use.”

“So by the third level--”

“We can cement that serving him is no better than her life before.”

“And she can outsmart him. He’s given her freedom, and she can use it to strike out on her own,” Bull finished.

“That’s perfect,” Leliana said, and Dorian almost jumped. All eyes in the room were on him and Bull. Even Solas, who was lowering his hand as though he’d been about to interject but hadn’t managed it, looked impressed. Dorian had forgotten, for a moment, that anyone else was even there. He turned away from Bull, shuffling his notes.

“Of course it is,” he said as he stacked them.

“The danger after seems to lie in how powerful a second enemy we’re creating,” said Cullen with a frown.

“Not if we strike quickly, and that’s what this plan was meant to give the chance to do. This sounds solid. You two make a good team,” Adaar said. Dorian stiffened a little. “Now the challenge is finding the opportunity.”

“We will need uninterrupted access for at least several hours,” Solas said.

“Leave that to me,” said Leliana, moving her hand to clear away the crystal’s projection. “I’ll report when I know more.”

Adaar nodded. “To work, then. Dismissed.”

Dorian grabbed his notes and left the room ahead of the others. He walked as quickly as he could across the main hall, and scaled a few flights of stairs and several corridors before reaching the door to his borrowed room. He slammed the door shut behind him and locked it. Then, his fingers on one hand lighting up as he held his papers with the other, he drew the circular pattern of a repelling glyph on the door’s surface. He stepped back as he finished, surveying the spellwork, then turned and tossed his notes onto the desk next to the door. He dropped himself into the chair in front of it, pressing his hands to his temples.

It had always been like that, before. Dorian and Bull, plotting the thread of dreams back and forth as though of one mind. Their words wove together until a picture emerged, until they made Fisher’s Company the most successful extraction team outside of Tevinter. Well, perhaps not only them. But Fisher wouldn’t have found half so much success without them.

It was a long time ago. Fisher was Maker knew where now, and Bull made his own way with his own men, and Dorian was--here, locked in his room like a coward.

It was just--he had fucking _missed_ this, and it sent an ache curling into his chest that hurt like hell.

The planning, working together, the ideas, just the _talking_.

Of course, that brought up very different memories. Nights in that wretched little hovel of a room in Ansburg that they fucked their way into sharing. Nights after Dorian stopped insisting on leaving to lie anxious and awake in his own bed. Nights after fucking Bull stopped being the easiest distraction and started being a bright and genuine attraction. Nights when they didn’t fuck at all. Bull had his own demons-- _ha_ \--that kept him awake, it seemed. He’d tell Dorian sometimes, stories about blood on Seheron sand, about dreams where he wore too many other faces, about a life unbalanced between the two. Other times, he fell silent, and the night stretched long before them both. Dorian would pull himself up from the bed and slip on the robe he’d bought from some Tevinter import shop in Antiva City, an almost assured fake that he loved anyway for its black silk and gold embroidery, and for how much it reminded him of the better parts of home. He’d pull it on and come back to bed with brandy, or wine, or a deck of cards.

“You should sleep,” Bull would say.

“I sleep all day,” Dorian would answer. “And I still have coin you haven’t won yet.”

Eventually, Dorian began to talk as well. Not of Rilienus. But other things. His parents. His youth. His work with Alexius, and the years of dreams.

Dorian would lay with his ear to the Bull’s chest and say, “I’ve slept through more of life than I’ve lived.”

And Bull would say--something. Dorian hardly remembered now, and didn’t that sting. Dorian would cling to his shoulders in the quiet space before dawn, restless, sleepless, and run a finger over the lines of Bull’s scars like he might trace some shape of comfort out of them. He didn’t speak the worst of his tragedies, and neither did Bull. Maybe that was what drew them together. Bull didn’t ask, and Dorian didn’t ask, and they fucked and drank and talked in circles until they both forgot anyway.

What a strange place to find love again.

Dorian moved to the window across the room. It overlooked Skyhold’s courtyard. There, heading into the tavern tucked against one of the inner walls, was Bull. Alone.

Dorian moved to his wardrobe. He gathered up his clothes, and what he could find of his courage.

 

* * *

 

Whoever made sure that this oversized fortress had a bar built into it knew what they were doing. Throwing hundreds of people up a mountain, choking the roadways with snow, and then _not_ having a steady supply of liquor might have ended the Inquisition before it really began. And, true to his point, a full house greeted Bull when he walked in.

The inside looked like something off of the cover of one of those Fereldan romance novels Grim liked to leave lying around the office. There was always a broad-chested blond man with furs slung over his shoulders, and he was always holding some swooning noblewoman in a ripped dress or a farm boy in tight leather leggings. Bull doubted the historical accuracy, to be honest. There was usually a mabari somewhere in the background, or pointedly mentioned as the hero’s loyal companion on the back summary, not that Bull had ever picked one up. The tavern was covered in the same stuffed deer heads, antler chandeliers, and decorative barrels he’d expect to see on one of those covers, and fiddle music warbled in from hidden speakers to complete the atmosphere. Bull had to chuckle to himself.

The Chargers had claimed a sprawling fireplace flanked by leather chairs for their group, glass mugs of ale already covering every available flat surface. Krem had beaten him there and claimed one of the chairs across from Grim, who looked happier than Bull had seen him in awhile. Bull smiled and waved, sparking a cheer that turned a few heads. He made his way over to them, passing a dwarf that seemed to be holding court at a table in the center of the room, telling some kind of story that had everyone around him leaning close to hear it. A blonde elf girl darted around the corner and slid under Bull’s arm, laughing as she ran. Bull shook his head, watching her go, before finally reaching his boys.

“Come on, Chief, plenty of ale to go around,” said Dalish from her perch on the arm of Krem’s chair, lifting her glass.

“On my tab, I assume,” he said, getting only cheers in answer. He rolled his eye. “Get anything stronger while you were at it?”

“No, we did not get you that disgusting Qunari engine oil you keep trying to pass off as a drink. Some of us want to actually wake up tomorrow morning,” Krem said.

“Lightweight,” mumbled Rocky, surprising a bark of laughter from Bull.

“At least one of you reprobates has taste,” Bull said.

“I still have taste _buds_ , and I’d like to keep them, thanks,” said Krem, waving Bull toward the bar.

This was good. Drinking with the boys. Something to focus on. He was pleasantly surprised to actually find _maraas-lok_ on the drink menu waiting for him at the end of the bar, though he winced a little at the import price. He’d seen a few other Tal-Vashoth passing through the courtyard besides the Inquisitor, but hadn’t figured any of them for going to the trouble to requisition Qunari liquor. The dwarf bartender raised an eyebrow when he ordered, then looked from his horns to his chest and back, shrugged, and turned to the long line of bottles stack behind him. Bull needed something strong tonight. If he drank enough of it, he’d fall asleep before he could think too hard about--

\--Dorian, who walked in the door just as Bull turned his eye away from the bar. The shirt and tie were gone in favor of something more distinctly Tevinter, a dark green tunic open at the neck and embroidered around his shoulders, cutting an asymmetrical line across his waist. Against the rustic decor of the tavern, he stood out completely, and drew more than a few looks as he paused in the doorway to scan the room. When he spotted Bull, he squared his shoulders and crossed to the bar, narrowly avoiding a dwarven waitress hoisting a full tray of drinks above her head.

“Here you go. Don’t ask me to pronounce it,” the bartender said, sliding a notably large tankard toward him. At least some things around here came in Qunari size.

Dorian walked up next to him, and the bartender smirked. “Usual?”

“Please,” said Dorian, pulling his wallet from his back pocket.

“On me,” Bull said, and Dorian looked ready to argue. Bull waved him off. Dorian’s brow furrowed.

“First time I haven’t gotten barked at or run from right away. Figured I’d push my luck,” Bull said, taking a drink from his tankard. It burned its way down his throat.

Dorian looked down. “Yes, I--about that. I--apologize.”

A mug of ale appeared in front of him, and Dorian took several gulps of it immediately. Bull watched his throat bob, then followed his hands as he slammed the mug back down.

“I see your taste in drinks is still upper class,” Bull said.

“I see your taste in drinks is still nonexistent,” Dorian said, nodding to the tankard.

“Not what you said that time in Rialto,” Bull said, quirking his lips.

“I still don’t _remember_ most of Rialto,” Dorian said. His face softened a little. “Look, about the day you arrived. I shouldn’t have been--” He flitted his fingers in the air, trailing off.

“An asshole?”

Another flick of his fingers. “That should cover it, yes.”

“All right,” said Bull, turning a little more toward him. He took another sip of his drink as the heavy smell of venison stew floated past them on an elven waiter’s tray. Dorian wrinkled his nose, following the tray with his eyes until it arrived in front of a black-haired soldier with a long beard, then dropping his gaze back to his drink.

“I didn’t expect you’d want to see me at all,” Dorian said. “And I wouldn’t exactly have blamed you.”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Bull said. “Knowing you’re all right? Not--rotting in some Tevinter jail, or lying in a ditch somewhere?”

“I might as well have been, in a few of those inns,” Dorian said. He managed to raise his eyes. “But I--I just thought you’d be angry. You should be, honestly.”

Bull fold his arms across the bar. “You did what you thought you had to do. I get that.”

“I left you in the middle of the night without a word, after--after everything,” Dorian said.

“You left a note.”

“Probably barely legible and explaining exactly nothing besides the fact that you’d been sleeping with a man accused of--” he paused, glancing around, and said more quietly, “murder.” He took another deep drink from his ale.

“Do you want me to start yelling at you? Would that help somehow?” Bull said, looking at him.

“I want you to realize you _should_ , you deserved better than--” Dorian squeezed his lips together, shutting his eyes. “You deserved better. And for what it’s worth, I regret every day that I couldn’t be that man.”

Bull opened his mouth to reply just as a hand clapped down on his shoulder. Krem leaned into view between them, making Dorian shrink back.

“What’d you do, Chief, make them go out back and empty out the delivery truck into your tankard? What’s the holdup?” Krem said, but he was looking pointedly at Dorian.

“Just doing some catching up,” Bull said.

“Right, right. Altus,” Krem said with a short nod.

“Cremisius,” Dorian replied curtly.

“There’s room, if you want to--” Bull said, finishing with a nod toward the fireplace.

“I won’t be staying,” said Dorian.

“Pity,” Krem said flatly. He gave Bull’s shoulder another clap and flashed him a look before turning back to the Chargers.

“Sorry, he just--” Bull started.

“Don’t be,” Dorian cut in. “They seem like an excellent company.”

“They are,” Bull said. He couldn’t help a small smile. “They’re a ragtag bunch, but you won’t find better.”

“No indeed. They were trained by the best,” said Dorian. He drained the last of his ale, then began fishing in his pockets.

“Hey, I said I got it,” Bull said, putting his hand on Dorian’s arm just as Dorian finally pulled out his wallet. Dorian stilled, staring at Bull’s hand for a moment. He swallowed. Bull started to pull away, but Dorian’s other hand came to rest on top of his. It lingered there for a moment before he gently pulled Bull’s hand away and began putting coins down on the bar top.

 

[ ](https://imgur.com/8nuAgHO)

 

“Dorian,” Bull said quietly. “That note you left. You said you were dealing with--”

“I’m working on it,” Dorian said quickly. He sighed. “Just, it’s better for both of us if you don’t--”

“Is this why you’re not building dreams anymore?”

Dorian looked up sharply. “How did you know?”

“All the design work except what I saw when I got here was Solas’s. You’re the best there is, and you don’t let anyone forget it. Why would you--”

“It’s safer,” Dorian cut him off, looking him in the eye. “Just...for now.” He glanced at the Chargers as laughter broke out from their circle. “And I’d appreciate it if you kept it to yourself.”

Bull opened his mouth, but something in Dorian’s eyes made him stop. He looked away. Dorian let out a breath, then stood, sweeping a hand toward the fireplace. “Go. Be with your team. Enjoy yourself.”

“Dorian--”

“I’m fine, Bull,” he said. “I’ve got it under control.”

“Are you sure?” Bull said.

Dorian sighed. “Yes. And it’s mine to deal with, no one else’s. Promise me you’ll respect that.”

Bull frowned, but after a moment, he gave a slow nod. “If that’s what you want.”

Seemingly satisfied, Dorian gave him a small, tight smile. “It’s what it needs to be. Good night, Bull.”

Bull watched him leave. A heaviness settled in his chest. _When it’s someone you care about, you give them what they need,_ came the echo of some old training in his mind. He shook his head and waved for the bartender, pointing at his drink.

 

\---

 

 _Should’ve finished off the damn bottle_ , Bull thought later as he lay in his room, staring up at the ceiling. The only light came from the dim blue glow of the light rune by the door and the white lights dotting the courtyard, far enough from his window to be only a soft glow against the curtains. They reminded him of the port lights in Minrathous winking at him from across the Waking Sea when he looked out his window in Alam. It was one of the few peaceful memories he brought with him out of Seheron: folding his arms on the window sill and laying his chin on them, looking at where the stars met the sea.

Sleep often eluded him at night, after his rotation as a Forger--a Hissrad--on the extraction teams. Two weeks on, two weeks off was the rule, to keep them all grounded in reality. Especially those like Bull, who learned to appear as others to the dreamers. The Ben-Hassrath mandated totems for the same reason, little portable reality checks, tools designed to assure someone they were awake. Perhaps the most personal, individualized possession the Qun allowed them.

He remembered, suddenly, a half-joking argument he had with Dorian once. Dorian was sprawled shirtless at the foot of Bull’s--their--bed, and Bull was more focused on the emphatic movements of Dorian’s fingers than on his words. It was an old argument, over whether the Imperium or the Qunari first used totems. The practice was so ancient Bull actually suspected the elves started it, but neither he nor Dorian really cared in the end. It was something to rib each other over, something that ended in Dorian laughing, wrestled onto his back, trying to jab at a ticklish spot under Bull’s ribs. Dorian made it easy to forget, back when Seheron was still a fresh wound, sluggishly bleeding.

It took the Qunari a long time to embrace dream-sharing, though a lot less time to perfect it. Higher-ups never admitted it, but whispers filtered down through the ranks one way or another. Tevinter started it--not dream-sharing itself, but using it as a war strategy against the Qunari. In the past, the Qunari trained themselves not to dream--a kind of meditation, some exercise of will, not something Bull tried to understand the mechanics of. It only mattered when he had to be trained back out of it. Since they didn't dream, Tevinter couldn't use the Qunari’s dreams against them in Seheron. But they could use the locals.

The Ben-Hassrath jumped on board pretty quick, after that. Bull chose not to think about who they pried the truth of that tactic from, or how. Rumor only told him so much, anyway. How long ago that was, how long it had taken, how they figured out how to do it--it wasn’t for him to know, and once he actually landed on Seheron, he was too busy to think about it anyway.

He began his rotating weeks of dreams and field work. It was a solid plan, at first, until the reality set in. Asleep, Bull pushed into the dreams of magisters to bring the Qun their plans. Awake, he pushed into the good graces of townspeople to bring the Qun their spies. He wore more faces than he could count, either way. He played roles in and out of dreams, over and over and over again, until it didn’t matter how often he held his tamassran chess piece, the totem whose weight only he knew. In the sea of faces, he couldn’t recognize his own. The world never felt real.

Then came the orphanage. He was never certain, in the end, which group had done it. All he remembered, after the tip came in, was walking into a school room full of limp, lifeless, tiny bodies, scattered on the ground as though taking an afternoon nap together. He stood at the center of the room staring down at the gun in his hand. Surely if he just held it to his temple, he might wake up from this nightmare, find himself back in his room, and see the lights outside his window. His unit found him just as he began to raise the gun.

He chose re-education, submitted himself without argument to the will of the Qun. In time, the ground under his feet felt solid again. He held his chess piece in his hands as he slept in a room on the other side of the island, where he couldn’t hear the sea. And when they were satisfied, they sent him away from Seheron and into Antiva. To Fisher’s Company. To Dorian.

It was probably as much of a test as anything they put him through in the Re-education Facility, if he stopped to think about it. Ha. Send the best Hissrad we have into the world, see if his heart remains strong. He wasn’t supposed to give it away altogether.

Not that it mattered now. _Ebost issala, Tal-Vashoth._ Dust and sand on the wind.

He hadn’t expected to see Dorian again, after he left. Bull knew the note Dorian placed on his pillow practically by heart. _My dearest Bull--I don’t expect you will ever forgive me for this, but for your own safety, I must go. There are things I never told you, things I hoped never to have to tell you._

“Things you still won’t tell me,” Bull murmured aloud into the dark. He sighed. There were things he hadn’t told Dorian, either.

It hadn’t mattered to Bull, all Dorian’s confessions in the letter. It wouldn’t have mattered even if Bull hadn’t already known what he did, hadn’t seen the dossier left in the dead drop with Dorian’s picture attached. Bull thought again of Dorian on his bed, arguing his point, gesturing wildly, interrupting every one of Bull’s points with another of his own, his mind working almost too fast for his mouth. Bull knew, even then, that he was going to throw that file in the fire.

He sighed again, rubbing at the scar tissue stretched over what was once the socket of his left eye. Definitely should’ve finished off that bottle. At least it would’ve knocked him out before he could start _thinking_. Well. _Asit tal-eb_. He pulled the covers high over his chest and closed his good eye.

 

\---

 

Work on the inception project accelerated in the few days following the meeting in the war room. An abandoned room below Josephine’s office became their office of central operations. It looked as though it might once have been a grand dining room, with its proximity to the castle’s kitchens, or perhaps some sort of sprawling gallery. Whatever it had once been, it was spacious, and shielded from prying eyes, with a security door at the top of a long staircase limiting access.

The Chargers went to work hauling chairs in and setting up a small lab space for Stitches in the remains of a forgotten little private library off to one side. They lugged in a table that soon filled with Solas’s drawings and three dimensional models, along with photographs, maps, and a crystal recorder strewn in haphazard piles. Books migrated in with Dorian, thunked down in the middle of the drawings before being pointedly relegated to one corner.

Extractors tended to keep strange hours, sleeping in snatches where the work allowed, so there was almost always someone working in the room no matter the time of day. Still, of all of them, Dorian lingered the most often, dragging in tome after tome of ancient Tevinter Fade maps, accounts of demon encounters, or dissertations on the nature of spirits. Every time Bull saw him, he was either bent over a book or carrying one, and each time, the circles under his eyes had grown darker.

Bull lumbered down the stairs one early morning to find Dorian cradling a thick compendium in his lap, his eyes drooping closed and his head nodding forward. He snapped awake when Bull tried to carefully pry the book away, his fingers clutching at it instinctively.

“Only me.” Bull held up his hands. Dorian blinked up at him and slowly relaxed his grip.

“I must have--” he started, but broke into a yawn before he could finish.

“Take a break, will you? You look like you haven’t slept in days,” Bull said. Dorian laughed--a high, uneasy sound--and Bull frowned.

“Hey, are you--”

The door upstairs clicked open, and Solas came quickly down the steps carrying one of his models. “I think I have it done. We need to test how the design holds up in the dream.”

“I’ll wake the boys,” Bull said, straightening.

“I should return these to the shelves,” Dorian said, getting to his feet and reaching for a few books piled on a rolling cart next to him.

“Nonsense, that can wait,” Solas said.

“You have it in hand,” Dorian said. “I’m rather tired--”

“You don’t want to see the fruit of all your labor?” Solas said, his brow furrowing. “That hardly sounds like you.”

“I’ve been--unwell,” Dorian said. “The Bull was just telling me I ought to be in bed.”

“We can do it without him,” Bull said.

“I’m afraid I need him there. He’s the only one who’s seen the magisterial estates, and I need to know if they’re accurate,” Solas said. “I suppose we can postpone, if you are ill.”

Dorian’s eyes flitted to Bull. He looked a little trapped, and that worried Bull. Solas was right, Dorian refusing to be a part of something he’d been working so hard on seemed wildly out of character. It made Bull think of Dorian’s letter: _This projection is different, beyond anything I understand…_

“Dorian,” he said softly. “If you need to--”

“Fine,” Dorian said abruptly, looking away. “Fine, yes, but let’s be quick about it.”

 

\---

 

The streets of Minrathous branched out from the Grand Proving Arena and its hanging gardens in the city center with a mathematical precision of space and shape even the Qunari might grudgingly appreciate. The architectural mark of the ancient mages that raised so much of the city’s foundations from the ground by sheer magic lingered heavily in the Old District. There sat the Temple that became the Minrathous Circle, and only several blocks away, the seat of the Magisterium. Rings of arches and columns stacked three stories high glinted white in the sun. The grand entrance wasn’t visible from the street they were trying to cross, but Bull remembered it well from his single glimpse years ago. A massive dragon’s head carved from marble. The tongue and lower jaw gaped open to serve as the staircase up to two massive golden doors at its throat, shaded by the snout and jagged teeth above. Its position gave the illusion that the building’s circular stories were the bony coils of its body. It left an impression.

The magisterial estates covered several blocks in all directions from the Magisterium building. These, too, had stood for centuries. Dragonling gargoyles perched on many of the rooftops, glaring down with bared teeth.

“Enough to make a man homesick,” Dorian murmured, gazing up at one of the statues.

“Is that approval that I hear?” Solas said from ahead of them.

“You adapted my sketches well,” Dorian said with a small smirk. Despite his glib tone, though, Bull saw his eyes continuously drift down each alley they passed, and move from face to face in the crowd.

His uneasiness started to make Bull tense, so Bull fell into step beside Krem instead.

“Look familiar?” he asked.

Krem scoffed. “Never made it to this part of the city. Not exactly the hangout for poor merchants’ kids. We only came here a few times, and spent most of our time in Three Imperators’ Square, or near the port.”

Bull nodded. “Only came a couple times myself.”

“Surprised they let you in,” Krem said, looking up a him. “They don’t exactly roll out the red carpet for Qunari.”

“Remind me to tell you about the Aurelius job,” Bull said, grinning to himself.

“Here we are. The house of Magister Erasthenes,” Solas said, coming to a stop in front of one of the few homes without gargoyles clinging to the eaves. A carved serpent occupied the stone between two arching windows on the second floor, and nude, dancing statues adorned either side of the front door.

“She will take the path we just did, from the Magisterium, and we will see to it she encounters her old friend Camila.” Solas glanced at Dalish. She smiled, and did a little twirl. The transformation came the instant she stopped: one moment it was Dalish’s face, tattoos curling delicately over her forehead, and the next it was another’s. Her complexion darkened a little, deeper lines creased the corners of her eyes and lips, and wispy salt-and-pepper curls framed her face, escaping from a loose bun at the top of her head.

“Your timing’s getting better. Could do without the twirl though,” Bull said, quirking his lips.

Dalish stuck her tongue out at him.

Solas cleared his throat. He spread an arm toward the door. “If you would?”

Dalish climbed the steps up from the street. She reached for the doorknob and pulled the door open.

“Well, hello.”

A figured stepped out from the darkness inside. Tall for a human, dark-haired, dark-eyed. The blurred photo of Erasthenes Leliana displayed in the war room showed only a hooded figure, features mostly obscured, but Bull had pictured him far older.

“Dalish, come away from there,” Dorian said suddenly, his voice urgent. Bull glanced at him. He looked panicked. Oh _crap_.

“No one should have been there,” Solas said, staring at the doorway. Dalish took a step back.

“I only wished to say hello,” said the man, stepping over the threshold. His eyes seemed fixed on Dorian. “It’s good to see you.”

“Rilienus,” Dorian said tightly. “Don’t.”

“What is this?” Krem said as Dalish backed carefully down the stairs.

Rilienus continued forward, stepping casually down the stairs. Still his gaze remained on Dorian. “Where have you been, love?”

“Please don’t,” Dorian choked out. He looked to Solas and said, “We need to leave. Now.”

“Going so soon?” said Rilienus, stepping onto the sidewalk. “But I only just--”

Solas’s voice cut through, speaking words Bull didn’t recognize. A glow enveloped him suddenly, and the projections passing on the street all stopped, their heads turning in unison toward the group. Then they moved, stampeding forward from all sides and grabbing for any one of the group they could reach. Bull saw more pouring in from the streets beyond before a fist slammed into his gut and he buckled forward. Hands clamped down on his arms and his horns. Others beat at his back, driving him to the ground.

He woke abruptly, the silence of their central operations room jarring and strange with the din of the crowd still ringing in his ears. He moved his free hand to his abdomen, rubbing away the phantom pain. His eye moved immediately to Dorian, lying on the cot next to him.

“What the fuck was that?” came Krem’s voice from Bull’s other side. “What kind of projection--”

“It wasn’t a projection,” Solas said. Stitches leaned down to pull the needle from Dorian’s arm, and Dorian numbly lifted a hand to the gauze.

“Then what was it?” Dalish said.

Solas opened his mouth, but paused, looking over at Dorian. Bull pursed his lips.

“That was him, wasn’t it?” Bull said softly.

Dorian avoided his gaze, and looked instead to Solas. “How did you stop him?”

“A spell to draw the attention of the projections,” Solas said. “Dorian--”

“I need to go,” Dorian said, standing.

“Not so fast, altus. You called it by name. You know something,” Krem said,

Dorian said nothing, marching straight for the stairs. Krem grabbed for his arm but Dorian wrenched away and broke into a sprint. Bull’s eye never left him as he went.

Krem rounded on Solas. “What was it?”

Solas hesitated. “I… can’t be completely certain, but it seems likely that it was a demon.”

Krem’s eyes widened, then jumped to Bull. “Did you know?”

“I didn’t know it was a demon,” Bull said, lowering himself to sit on his cot again.

“But you knew something.” Krem folded his arms.

“I knew he had personal shit going on, but do you think for one fucking second I would’ve put my men in danger if I knew it was a damn demon?” Bull said, looking up sharply at Krem.

Krem huffed a breath and relented, looking away. “Fine. But he owes us an explanation.”

“He owes us his liver,” Skinner said, hovering near Dalish, a hand at her side where Bull knew one of her hidden daggers sat. Bull ran a hand over his face. _Fuck._

 

\---

 

Dorian turned his eyes skyward and puffed an exasperated breath as heavy footsteps began pounding up the library staircase. It was too much to hope they’d let it go, let him deal with it on his own. Or at least wait to come bashing his skull in until after he stopped teetering on the edge of panic. He’d spent days avoiding sleep save for an hour here or there to keep him on his feet. It was, for the moment, the only solution he could think of. He spent every moment he could steal researching demons and ways to deal with them, at a loss for even the first step to take. And hesitant to even take it, if he was honest with himself. No matter how many times he told himself it was a demon, reminded himself of the memory of Thorn’s fallen body in the street, the demon still wore Rilienus’s face, and the guilt _ached_.

He rubbed at his forehead with a sigh and strolled over to an empty table stretched longways between two sets of bookshelves. He pulled out the chair at the head of the table and then stood to the side of it, arms folded. It stopped him short when, instead of Bull, it was Krem who marched around the corner and skidded to a stop. He looked ready to tear down the shelves around them.

“Well, what a lovely surprise,” Dorian said. Even to his own ears, his voice sounded dull and tired.

“Start talking, altus,” Krem said, folding his arms and glaring.

Dorian swept a hand toward the chair he’d pulled out. “Have a seat.”

“Just like that?” Krem said. “After your temper tantrum downstairs?”

“I’d be happy to throw you over the railing if you’d prefer. I would hate not to live up to expectations,” Dorian said, raising an eyebrow. Krem continued to glare. Dorian sighed again, looking toward the bookshelves. “Listen, I know when to fold. I’m not going to dispute what I owe you and if you’re not going to leave well enough alone then you might as well have a seat and we can get this over with.”

Krem finally moved toward the chair. Dorian took the seat to his left.

“How much has Bull told you?” Dorian asked.

“You worked together back in Antiva, for his old company. You were… _together_ for a while but you had to break it off and he lost touch with you. You have a ‘complicated past’ and a bunch of ‘personal crap’ going on, like you’re the only one,” Krem said, his lip slowly curling as he went. “He doesn’t _have_ to tell me he’s got a soft spot a mile wide for you because he’s Iron fucking Bull, and he never met a charity case he couldn’t squeeze into that oversized heart of his, not that you seem interested in returning the favor.”

“You have no idea what my feelings are, or anything about me for that matter, apparently,” Dorian said, frowning.

“Then enlighten me,” Krem said, leaning forward a little. “What the fuck did you do to get a demon’s attention?”

Dorian tensed. He wrapped his index finger around one his rings and began to spin it around his thumb. “That’s what Solas said it was?”

Krem only raised his eyebrows in answer. Dorian looked down at his hands. “This is probably a longer story than you bargained for.”

“Then get on with it.”

Dorian wet his lips. “I assume from your accent it won’t be necessary to explain the ins and outs of Tevinter societal rules.”

“No, it will not. There’s a reason I left,” Krem said.

“Then you know that among the alti, it is unacceptable for one man to love another,” Dorian said. “The pressures and expectations as far as family alliances through marriage, and the political weight. Social boundaries.”

“Yes, what a terribly hard life you rich nobles lead,” Krem said.

Dorian gritted his teeth, but continued, “Well, despite my parents’ best efforts and most clearly-conveyed disappointment, men are my only interest. I learned to keep the affairs brief and secret, until I met Rilienus.”

A small smile fought its way to Dorian’s lips. “Rilienus was… compelling. He was vibrant and handsome and creative--”

“What does this have to do with the demon?” Krem interrupted.

“I’m getting there, if you’ll have a minute’s patience,” Dorian said.

“You met a man, fell in love, get to the point,” Krem said, tapping his fingers on his arm.

Dorian narrowed his eyes, annoyed, but continued, “You know of the connections of the highborn alti to the Dreamers, the ancient mages who could--”

“--bend the Fade to their will and make anything they wanted, yes, you lot never shut up about it,” Krem said.

“Then unsurprisingly, Rilienus and I both specialized in dream architecture at the Circle. We began sharing dreams.” It had been a long time since Dorian thought of Rilienus in those first days. Dorian had been so taken with the way Rilienus grinned at him across the lecture hall, the corner of his mouth tipping up, his gaze heated. He looked inviting and smug and amused all at once as Dorian smiled back, the senior enchanter droning his lesson in the background, forgotten.

Smothering a smile at the thought, he said, “We discovered it was an easily explainable way to have all the time in the world we wanted together. Hide in a few hours of dreams, you have whole days with no one else in the world but the two of you, building your own world around yourselves. And the more we did it, the further we pushed, going into deeper dreams and dreams inside dreams so our time together could be weeks, months, all in the space of a single night.”

A vivid memory struck Dorian of that same wicked smile on Rilienus’s lips as they laid down on Dorian’s bed, shirts lost somewhere on the floor, their fingers twining together as their eyes closed. He closed his eyes a moment.

“You did this just the two of you? No chemist, no one to monitor you?” Krem said.

“We stole sedatives and sleep drugs from the Circle,” Dorian said, looking back up. He could almost hear Rilienus’s muffled laughter in his ears as they scampered out of the storage room. “Or sometimes I could find excuses to use what my mentor Alexius had. We sneaked into each other’s rooms, or to hotels. We were young and in love and drunk with our own freedom.”

“You were idiots, you could’ve been--”

“Oh, Cremisius, you do care,” Dorian said, earning an especially acidic glare. His grin faded a little, after a moment. “Yes, well, don’t get ahead of me.”

Krem motioned for him to continue.

Dorian began to turn one of his rings around his finger again. “One day we decided to push further than we’d ever gone.” He paused, pursing his lips. “We took the most powerful sedative we could find, and ended up asleep for a couple days. We reached the place they call ‘Limbo.’”

Krem looked up sharply, his eyes widening a little. “You reached Limbo. You actually went there.”

Dorian nodded, not quite meeting Krem’s gaze. He swallowed. “We did.”

“Bullshit,” Krem said, a little too loudly. A dwarven woman working a few alcoves over looked up at them and frowned. Krem lowered his voice. “Limbo’s just a rumor, no one knows if it’s even real. You want me to believe you’ve _been_ there?”

Dorian tilted his head a little, mouth in a straight line. His fingers went still around his ring. “I’ll grant you that I can’t prove it. But I know it was a place beyond what I’ve ever experienced, before or since. A place of pure creation. I’ve heard some speculate it’s the ‘real’ Fade, beyond the levels we normally reach in our dreams--what the Veil, if it exists, limits us to. We built there as we had never built before. We built _inside_ the dream, our own entire city, creating and destroying and recreating whenever we wanted. So yes, I believe it was Limbo.”

Dorian stared at the wood grain of the table, picturing their world rising from the surface. Impossible skyscrapers divided by city streets paved with glass, rivers running beneath. A skyline that made the rigid bones of a dragon when the sun set behind it. Office buildings that rose from a jungle floor, wreathed with flowers. Apartments that lined the branches of giant, sprawling trees. Beaches with black and blue and violet sand that shimmered as though filled with stars. His fingers twitched as though he need only reach out and trace the memories in the woodgrain of the table to see it all before him again.

“If that’s true, sleeping that long, that deep--” Krem said, prompting Dorian to blink away the images and straighten. “--days could become years down there.”

“Yes. It’s difficult to say how long it was. Time is--different, there. Strange. If it exists at all,” Dorian said. He frowned. “And I suppose that was--the danger. It was so easy to lose ourselves there.”

How could he explain it? The power to create anything--entire worlds, down to each grain of sand. An unparalleled, divine sort of art. Euphoric. Magnificent. And addictive. There was a rather terrifying part of Dorian that understood what Corypheus so craved in trying to reach the Fade. Could he really blame Rilienus, in the end, for not wanting to leave?

“Eventually,” he said slowly, finding it more difficult to continue, “I grew...restless. No, that’s not the word. I simply--” Dorian circled his fingers in the air, searching for words. This was more than he had told even Bull in his letter, but now that he’d started, he couldn’t seem to stop himself. “Let me put it this way. I knew we had to return. Our bodies weren’t built to sustain our minds in that place forever. We might be discovered. Any number of things could happen. But Rilienus refused. He wanted to believe that world was the world we belonged in, and we could just forget the real world had ever existed.”

Too easy a summary. How many days-- _weeks_ , maybe--did they waste arguing? The world, attuned to them so keenly, seemed to grow brittle around them. Buildings crashed into the sea on the edge of the city. Roads cracked down the middle. The sky grew dull and grey. _You’re doing this on purpose. You’re trying to destroy everything we built!_ Rilienus screamed at him. _Go back if that’s what you want. Go back to that shriveled nightmare world and all its bullshit! You’ll come running back. This is more real than that world could ever be. This is what we were meant for._

“I finally realized,” Dorian said quietly, after a moment, “That the only way I could get him to return with me was to--change his mind. Literally.”

“Inception,” Krem said, realization dawning across his face, and then melting into a frown. “You messed with his mind.”

“It was that or leave him in that place,” Dorian said.

“You couldn’t have woken him up?” Krem said. “The drugs were eventually going to wear off. When you got back from Limbo--”

“That deep, even when the drugs wear off, your mind can get lost. Trust me, I’ve studied this work more extensively than you have. It could’ve meant a coma, brain damage--he could’ve died,” Dorian clenched his jaw. “I couldn’t have lived with that. I had to do something.”

Krem leaned back and folded his arms, making no reply. Dorian’s eyes dropped back to his hands. Finally, he said, “I found a house, hidden somewhere in the city. Something Rilienus must have put there. It looked unlike anything else we’d built. It was old, and broken down.”

He closed his eyes as he thought of the house, such a small, decrepit little thing cowering in the shadows of the skyscrapers around it. He hadn’t been looking for it, hadn’t even known it existed. The stone had been old, blackened with soot and what must have been years of dirt. The door creaked loudly as he pulled it open. Old, threadbare furniture covered the inside: couches and chairs with bits of stuffing escaping the cushions; bookshelves leaning at odd angles, vomiting their books all over the floor; a single piano in the corner, the keys crooked and discolored. And everywhere, everywhere, thousands of picture frames. Dorian had picked one up off the edge of the piano when he recognized his own face under the glass. And then, in the corner of the room, he had caught sight of something under a leaning bookshelf.

He kept his eyes closed as he said to Krem, “I found a safe there, left open. And inside, Rilienus had left his totem. He hadn’t locked it, but he’d put it away, where he could forget it.”

Dorian remembered kneeling in the dust, and pulling the door open to find only the small hourglass he now carried with him. How he’d pulled it out into the light to stare at it, all the sand sitting in the base. He opened his eyes back in the library, and reached into his pocket. He looked at Krem as he pulled the hourglass out, setting it on the table between them.

“In the dream,” said Dorian, a little hoarse now, “the sand falls endlessly. I--realized what that house was, the reality Rilienus was trying to hide from himself. So I made a choice. I planted a doubt, one single doubt, that the world we made was real. I tried to make him recognize, deep in his mind, that it was all a dream, and we didn’t belong there.” He turned the hourglass over, letting the sand slip down, just as he had in Limbo. Krem stared at it, then looked back up at Dorian.

“And it worked,” he said.

Dorian’s smile was bitter. “Too well.”

His eyes drifted to the bookshelf next to them. He focused on the patterned spines, tracing the shape, to clear the memory from his mind.

“What happened?” Krem said.

Dorian finally glanced up back at him. “When we woke, the idea lingered. It grew. Rilienus became convinced this world was the dream, and we needed to wake up and go back to the real world, the world we made. No matter what kind of help I sought out for him, no magic or science or words would convince him. The only catch was that he wouldn’t go alone. He begged me to come back with him. I should have--I should have seen the danger then.”

Dorian’s throat tightened. He looked down at his lap, composing himself. “One weekend, he booked us a room in his favorite hotel in Minrathous, made me promise to meet him there.”

White curtains, twisting in the breeze, brushing against white couches. And there sat Rilienus on the edge of the bed, a bottle in his hands. Dorian’s eyes stung, and in fits and starts he tried to describe to Krem the worst night of his life. Rilienus’s voice, so unnaturally calm, his fingers so steady and still around the poison. Dorian, frozen near one of the couches, staring at the bottle.

“I’ve taken care of everything,” Rilienus had said, so gently. “Don’t worry, my love. I know you don’t want to make this choice. I’ve made it for you.”

“Rilienus, what are you talking about?” Dorian had said uneasily.

“I told Aurelius and Julian that if something happened to me, you would be to blame. That I fear for my safety.” So calm, how could he be so _fucking_ calm?

“Why would you do that?” Dorian had choked out, fingers curling into the edge of the couch.

“To free you,” Rilienus had said. “The choice is made. Drink with me, and we can be together, where we were meant to be. You promised we’d always be together.”

“No, Rilienus, not like this. Not this way. _This_ is our world. This is what’s--”

But before Dorian could reach him, before he could even call a sliver of magic to his fingers or take a single step, Rilienus had opened the bottle and swallowed part of the contents. Dorian had cried out, arm half-raised, and Rilienus only smiled, and held out the bottle. Dorian, tears streaming down his face, fell to his knees, shaking his head. Rilienus’s smile finally faltered, a look of pain beginning to twist into his features.

Dorian squeezed his eyes shut, willing the image away. He turned his face away from Krem’s. “He died in my arms.”

“ _Fasta vass_ ,” Krem muttered.

Dorian took several long, slow breaths. He kept his head down until he was certain the tears wouldn’t fall. “So I fled. I took what things I had with me and ran. There was a warrant for my arrest within hours, but I made a train to Nevarra before it came through. I spent several months on the run before I ended up with Fisher’s Company.”

“They took you in with an active warrant?” Krem said.

“My name never came up in the news, that I saw. I’d wager my last crown that my father paid dearly out of the family fortune to see to that, to rescue whatever shreds of their reputation I hadn’t destroyed,” Dorian said, frowning. “Besides that, Fisher wasn’t exactly an innocent himself. And while you may roll your eyes, a Tevinter altus architect is a prize in this business. He had leverage, I had talent, it worked in his favor, so he took me. There I met Bull.”

Dorian sighed. “Forgive me if I keep the rest of this brief, this is entirely more confessional a conversation than I had intended.”

“I keep telling you to get to the point,” said Krem.

“Yes, well. Not long after, the dreams started. I’d dreamt of Rilienus since his death, but these were different. They felt more real. _He_ felt more real. At first I thought it was simply grief. Perhaps guilt for moving on. But he became more--solid. Interactive. And I missed him, so I relished the dreams, at first. Whatever Bull and I had--that specter of the past was always there. Literally, apparently. Eventually, he took bolder moves to get my attention. Appeared in dreams that weren’t mine. He--attacked someone on the team in a dream. They thought he was a projection, never knew--but I couldn’t put people in danger like that. Least of all Bull. So I left him a note and I ran. I’ve been trying to find answers as best I can ever since, but I never dreamed of it being a demon until the Breach opened.”

Krem frowned. “So you knew you were a danger and yet today you still--”

“I tried not to share the dream. But I couldn’t very well tell Solas I thought I was being pursued by a demon.”

“Why the fuck not?” Krem said.

Dorian opened his mouth, reconsidered, and shut it. He tried again. “Because I--”

“Because you’re too fucking proud to admit it? I’m not going to say this whole thing wasn’t some shit, but you work with a Fade expert. You had Bull. He’d have helped you years ago, if you weren’t so busy pining after a dead man, and using Bull to stop the pain.”

Dorian held Krem’s gaze, glaring up at him. “It is not,” he said, slowly carving each word between his teeth, “anywhere in the vicinity of that simple.”

“Of course it isn’t. Then how would you be interesting enough for anyone’s sympathy?” Krem said.

Dorian scowled. “If that’s how you want to play this, we’ll keep it simple. You are not a mage, Cremisius, so the explanation is clearly over your head. Trust your betters to deal with things that are beyond you and don’t concern you.”

Krem leapt from his chair and yanked Dorian forward by the collar. The chair clattered to the floor behind him.

“The fuck it doesn’t concern me. Your pet demon came after my friends, you gold-plated piece of shit,” Krem said. “And it’s not going to get a second chance.”

Dorian narrowed his eyes. “Let go of me, boy, before I have to do something you’ll regret.”

Krem tightened his grip, raising his fist. “Oh please, threaten me again. I’ve wanted an excuse to break that perfect nose for weeks and I swear to the Maker, I’ll enjoy every fucking crack.”

“But you do admit it’s perfect,” said Dorian.

Krem launched his fist forward. Dorian reacted, a wave of magic flying from his hand into Krem’s stomach to knock him back, but a moment too late to avoid a solid punch to the nose. Krem released his shirt in surprise, even as the force of his fist sent Dorian stumbling back into the table. Krem toppled to the ground, half on top of his own chair.

The dwarf woman from earlier stood quickly from her chair, and a few others came running toward the alcove they’d been sitting in.

“As fun as all of this is,” Dorian said, panting, as he pushed himself up from the table, “I am not going to fight you. You’re strong, I’ll give you that, but I could burn your hair from your head with my pinky if I had a mind. Fortunately for you, I don’t.”

He stood, slowly, feeling blood begin to pour from his nose and over his lips. He reached to touch it and cringed. He looked up at the small crowd gathering and waved them off, then looked back down at Krem. “Here is where we’re going to leave this. I will solve my own problems and keep them well away from anyone that might get hurt, especially Bull. It’s the safest I can possibly keep him and above anything else in this rampant tornado of shit, I want him safe.”

Krem rolled gingerly away from the chair, wincing and then scowling up at Dorian. Dorian frowned back, reaching into his pocket for his handkerchief.

“Now, I’m going to retire for the evening, and you’re going to go buy Bull a drink and tell him what a shitstain I am, and everyone’ll be happy.”

“You _are_ a shitstain. And an arrogant son of a bitch,” Krem growled.

“All true, I’m afraid. Particularly the bit about my parentage,” Dorian said, stepping around Krem and pressing the handkerchief carefully to his nose as he moved toward the stairs.

“So you’re just going to keep running away from every problem you create, huh?” Krem called after him. Dorian paused mid-step.

Krem slowly began pushing himself up from the floor. “Have you even bothered talk to Bull since he got here, or have you been too busy ‘solving’ your problems? And I mean really talk to him, not make puppy eyes at him at the bar? Do you even know how he became Tal-Vashoth? How he lost the eye? You don’t, do you? Your head is so far up your own arse you can’t see anyone else. You used him. You don’t deserve him or the time he wastes caring about you.”

Dorian started walking again. “Finally,” he called over his shoulder, “something we can agree on.”

 

\---

 

Krem’s words followed Dorian to the healer, distracting him as she gently pressed her hands, wreathed with healing magic, to the bent line of his nose. He thought of them as she pressed a bandage over his nose and taped it there, reminding him the magic would heal the break but not the bruising, and to keep it bandaged for several days. Dorian nodded distractedly, barely hearing her.

He was tired. So, so tired. And sleeping would only compound the problem. He was surprised the Inquisitor hadn’t come after him yet, or sent one of her representatives to throw him in the ancient dungeon a castle like this probably had to have somewhere. Perhaps they were still arguing over what to do with him. He wasn’t even sure himself what they ought to do with him. Send him far away, at the least, but then, that might be sending a dangerous man out among innocents. Kill him? The _prudent_ way to deal with a demon, Solas said. He mumbled a long string of curses under his breath as he made his way back to his room. Well, if that was how it was to be, then he could still make one thing right. When he finally reached his room, he sent Bull an audiogram. He lit a fire in the dusty old hearth to one side of his room, poured himself a glass of wine, and set out another beside the bottle. He dropped into a chair in front of the fireplace, trying to ignore his racing heart. He waited.

The knock came not half an hour later. Dorian set down his glass and opened the door to Bull in a light sweater that stretched a bit over his massive chest. Because that was definitely going to help keep Dorian focused.

Bull’s eye went straight to the bandage on Dorian’s nose, and he winced a little. “Krem told me you--uh--talked.”

“Enchanting young man,” Dorian said, heading straight back to the fireplace and leaving Bull to close the door. Dorian reached for his wine glass, paused, and grabbed the neck of the bottle instead. He tipped it back, taking a heavy swig, mindful of his nose. Then he held it out to Bull. Bull took it and set it down on the table.

“Suit yourself,” Dorian said, dropping back into the chair next to it. He gestured toward its twin on the table’s other side. “Sit if you like.”

Bull slowly lowered himself down, favoring his right side a little. “You wanted to talk?”

Dorian frowned at Bull’s leg. “That knee’s still bothering you, isn’t it?”

Bull shrugged. “It acts up now and then. It’s fine.”

“You’re still using the salve on it?” Dorian said.

“Dorian. It’s fine.”

Dorian sighed and reached for his wine glass, taking a drink. Bull eyed him, waiting, and it was making Dorian’s skin itch.

“Why do you always have to be so _reasonable_ about things?” he muttered into his wine glass.

“That’s what you wanted to talk about?” Bull said.

“No, I wanted to complain about it, because it’s frankly irritating,” said Dorian. “I brought a demon down on your team today. You ought to be furious. I’m sure the Inquisition is.”

“I’m not happy about it,” Bull said. “But you tried to get out of it. And you stopped it.”

“Solas stopped it.”

“But you warned us. It’s not like you threw it at Dalish on purpose. I’m angry at _it_. I’m _worried_ about you,” Bull said.

Dorian looked away. “I’m dealing with it.”

“Dorian--”

“Anyway, that isn’t why I asked you here. Though I do--apologize, for that display today,” Dorian said. He took another sip of wine. “I realized after my chat with Cremisius I hadn’t...asked you about your life, since we parted.”

Bull sat back. “What do you want to know?”

Dorian tilted his head. “Well, I have a rather clear memory of you having two eyes, last we spoke.”

Bull gave a small chuckle. “Ah. Yeah. Guess that’s hard to miss.”

Dorian raised his eyebrows. “Does it have anything to do with you being Tal-Vashoth now?”

Bull stiffened, just a little. He took a moment to answer. “Not exactly. It’s...actually how I met Krem.”

Dorian furrowed his brow. “You met him--while losing your eye?”

“He was in some trouble with the Tevinter military. Used to be a soldier. Some assholes cornered him in a bar, old comrades or something, and they were going after him with a broken bottle.” Bull shrugged. “I happened to be there when it started up. I got in between them, took the blow instead.”

“How can you say that like you’re telling me the weather?” Dorian said, sitting up straighter. “You saved his life.”

Bull shrugged again. “I did what I could.”

Dorian set his wine glass down altogether. “You lost an _eye_ for him.”

“He’s a good kid,” Bull said. “Didn’t deserve that shit.”

“ _Vishante kaffas_ ,” Dorian said. “So--what about the Qun, then? Why did you leave?”

Bull’s eye drifted to the fire. He didn’t move, his posture didn’t change, his muscles didn’t tense. But all the same, something in the mood shifted. It took him a moment to answer.

“I just--realized, over time, that my loyalties had changed.”

Dorian frowned. “Your loyalty was steel, Bull, from the moment I met you. I think you spent more time trying to extol the Qun’s virtues to me than you did fucking me. You cannot expect me to--”

“They asked things of me,” Bull said, cutting him off. “Things I realized I couldn’t do. I made my choice and it’s done.”

“What did they ask?”

Dorian watched Bull’s jaw tighten. Then he began to stand. “I think I’m done for the night. Sorry about the nose.”

“Bull,” said Dorian, pushing out of his own chair to catch up. Fear was mounting in his gut, a fear he could barely name.

“I said leave it, Dorian,” said Bull. Dorian intercepted him as he pulled the door open, reaching to push it shut again and stand in front of the door jamb.

“Dorian--”

“Tell me what they asked for, Bull,” Dorian said, staring up at him as a terrible suspicion rose in tingles through his body. Bull stared back, stone-faced.

“Tell me, Bull--!”

“You,” said Bull. “For a start.”

The rising fear crashed down through Dorian’s ribs and into his gut. The whole world seemed to stop.

“I beg your pardon?” he whispered. His hands shook against the door.

“They wanted you,” Bull said. Dorian wasn’t sure if it was better or worse that Bull’s gaze never wavered as he said it. Behind them, a log snapped and toppled in the grate.

“ _Kaffas_ ,” he breathed. “You knew from the beginning.”

Bull swallowed, still looking at Dorian, still his expression blank and unmoving. “What I told you about me back then was true. I worked in dream extraction for the Ben-Hassrath, and between jobs I worked on Seheron in peacekeeping. A job went bad, I turned myself in, got re-assigned to work in Antiva. They _did_ want to learn techniques, did want to keep tabs on how much of a threat it was to us. But they already had a full dossier on you. Knew the work you’d done with Alexius.”

“But how--”

“Not important,” Bull said, but Dorian already knew the answer. One of Alexius’s servants, the newest one before Dorian left, the brown-haired elf girl that brought them meals and cleaned the study after their long nights at work. Maker’s hairy balls.

“You were dangerous,” Bull continued, “but also brilliant. I was sent to watch you. To see if your loyalties might be fragile enough to shift after you fled Tevinter.”

Dorian closed his eyes, no longer able to bear Bull’s gaze. “So you got close to me. You--you talked to me, probed at the bruises. Pretended to care about me--”

“At first, yes, but then--”

Dorian’s eyes snapped open. “You talked your way into my bed, made me think it was my idea--”

“That wasn’t part of--”

“No?” Dorian pushed away from the door, closer to Bull. “No? That wasn’t in the orders? ‘Fuck the pretty mage until he’s putty in your hands, until he’d follow you to Qunandar and let you hand him to his enemies’ wasn’t the command? Was that just your brilliant idea? Get me to open up, get me to tell you things I’d never told anyone, stay up to all hours not even fucking me, just talking, debating, holding me like it fucking meant something?”

He was shouting now. He didn’t care. He was standing close enough to see the muscles in Bull’s face finally shift, his brow bend just a little, his eye go soft. A crack in the mask. How fucking novel.

“It did mean something,” Bull said, quiet, slow. “It meant everything.”

“Oh don’t fucking do that now,” Dorian spat, fists clenching at his sides. “Don’t lie to me again.”

“I’m not,” Bull said, and Dorian wanted to smack away the earnestness that bled suddenly onto Bull’s face.

“I’m not,” he said again. “I was supposed to get close to you, see if I could persuade you. But the closer I got, the more of you I saw, the way--fuck, the way you looked at me, the way your mind worked. But not just that. You--started to tell me, the night before you left, about what happened. With Rilienus. And it sounded so much like what happened to me. And I saw what I already knew, that I couldn’t do it.”

He closed his eye for a moment. The fire snapped again, the flight of a few sparks catching Dorian’s attention.

“I wasn’t supposed to love you,” Bull said. “But I did. And when you woke up that morning and left the letter on my pillow and kissed my head--I was awake, and I was supposed to stop you. Take you in.”

“You let me go,” Dorian’s voice went hoarse. His ears were ringing, and he felt a terrible weight settle in his chest. In the sour pit of his stomach. How long had he ached to hear those words? How bitter to hear them now.

“We made the same choice,” Bull said. “To protect each other.”

“That doesn’t change the fact that you lied. That you--you manipulated me, that you--”

“Yes, you’re right. You’re right about all of it,” Bull said.

“And now I’ve been the ruin of two different men that I loved,” Dorian said. Bull’s face crumpled. Finally.

“No, Dorian, I--”

“I can’t,” Dorian said, turning away. His eyes stung, and nausea swelled in his stomach. “I can’t be that man. I need you to go.”

“Dorian--”

“Leave,” Dorian snapped. He hung his head, squeezing his eyes shut as tears sprang from them, wetting the bandage on his nose. He said again, more softly, “Please just go.”

Mercifully, his knees waited until the click of the door to give out.

 

\---

 

Dorian woke from a shallow sleep at the first thin hints of dawn in the sky. He still wore his clothes from the night before, his shirt hopelessly wrinkled and smothered beneath him. He tried to move his arm from beneath the pillow and knocked his fingers against hard glass. He blinked up through the dim, pressing the pillow out of the way, to see an empty wine bottle resting against the headboard. A purplish, pulsating light was reflecting oddly in the glass. Dorian squinted at the night table. The crystal phone there blinked on and off. An audiogram. Dorian groaned a curse and turned his face back into the pillow.

He winced when he felt the bandage over his nose stretch a little awkwardly with the movement. He reached up and carefully pried the tape away, gingerly testing the pain with his fingertips. The healing had done its job; the line of his nose seemed intact, but it was extremely sore to the touch. He didn’t want to imagine the bruise blossoming over his face.

He glanced back at the night table again. The phone still pulsed slowly. He knew whose voice he’d hear if he let the crystal play. Well, that or the Inquisition was sending courtesy calls rather than beating his door down. He considered throwing it across the room and letting it shatter against the wall. Worse, he considered actually pulling it to him and listening to it.

He wanted, terribly, stupidly, to believe that Bull loved him back then--loved him still, fuck, _fuck_ \--and to ignore the rest. The chance that it all was a lie, that the love he’d held onto for so long had been nothing more than Bull toying with him for his own ends, was too much to bear. It didn’t seem like Bull to do such a thing. But then, hadn’t he always been a Forger? Hadn’t he always known how to play the right part, make anyone believe he was someone else? What did Dorian really know of him? He thought of Krem’s words. _Have you even bothered to talk to him?_

Bull had left the Qun, or so he said. He had no reason to be that man now. Could he still play such a part years later, inspiring such a violent loyalty in all his men? Would he lie to them too? To what end? It didn’t change what he’d done, that he’d lied to Dorian, but if he could just believe that was in the past...

And really, if he was being honest, hadn’t omitted truths been the name of the game in the beginning? Dorian knew the Iron Bull was Qunari, true Qunari, knew he sent reports back to the Ben-Hassrath. Bull knew Dorian was a fugitive, barred from Tevinter, if not why. They knew only the framework of each other’s lives. Truths came like puzzle pieces between them; they built pictures of one another in broken fragments with whole corners missing, or sometimes, just one little piece that left a hole in the middle. Trust came slowly. Perhaps it wasn’t so strange that Bull kept secrets. But how was Dorian to grapple with Bull knowing so many of Dorian’s from the start? He knew Dorian was wanted for murder, and knew some piece of his life with Rilienus, though Maker only knew how the Qunari got that information. And, if he was to be believed, he fell in love with Dorian in spite of it all.

Dorian rolled onto his side, staring at the flashing light of the crystal. He pursed his lips, then reached for the phone and pressed his thumb to the crystal. The light filled it and brightened.

“Dorian,” came Bull’s voice, roughened and soft. Dorian closed his eyes. There was a pause, then a sigh. “If you listen to this, you don’t--you deserve to be mad. I never told you because I was selfish. I didn’t want--I didn’t want you to think I’d lied about everything, and now I’m sure you do. But I loved you. I still do. That’s real. I know you’ve got no reason to believe me, and you sure as shit don’t owe me anything for saying it, but it’s true.”

Dorian tasted copper. He realized suddenly how hard he’d been biting his lip and released it, trying to keep his breathing even. He squeezed his eyes shut tighter.

“And I wanted you to know that what you said, about being the cause of me leaving the Qun? You weren’t. You didn’t--make me take another path. You just make me realize there was one. I still thought I could be that guy, for a while. I didn’t finally leave until they made me choose between the Qun and my boys. It’s--a long story. But I’d like to tell you, some time. Listen I--don’t expect you to forgive me. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I didn’t know how. But I should’ve tried.”

Some treacherous part of Dorian reminded him that he’d been just as cowardly, leaving a note for Bull to tell him about Rilienus and leaving before he risked having to see Bull’s face. Before he’d have to watch another love die before his eyes. He wondered if Bull might have confessed his own secrets, if Dorian had stayed.

“If you listened this far--I know things are shit. I don’t know what’s going to happen now. But--please don’t run away again. Please.”

Oh for fuck’s _sake_. Bull’s voice went so wretchedly quiet as he said it, the way it did when he used to whisper stories of Seheron into Dorian’s hair, just before dawn. Silence followed, the crystal’s audio clicking off, and the light with it, leaving Dorian in the dark. He slipped the phone back on the night stand. Then he pressed a hand over his eyes, mindful of his nose.

He didn’t want to run. He was tired of running, and he had nowhere left to run to. This was the only place in the world he stood a chance of being free of this demonic nightmare. But he wasn’t going to get the chance to ask Bull all the questions he needed to, and to give him a piece of his mind for being such a--such a damn idiot, if they finally locked him up or did whatever it was they were going to do.

He had to face this. Once and for all. Before he lost everything.

Dorian sat up. He threw the covers back, fumbling in the dim for a clean shirt, and then for his shoes. He thought briefly of tracking down another bandage for his nose, but decided not to bother. With any luck, Stitches was working as early as he usually did in his lab.

 

\---

 

“This is dangerous, Dorian,” Stitches said for the third time, resting his hands on his hips.

“Of course it is,” Dorian said. Again.

“You’re going to get yourself killed, altus.”

If anything could indicate the wretched state of Dorian’s recent luck, it was stumbling on Krem working alongside Stitches when he arrived. Dorian had very nearly turned right back around on the stairs.

“Solves your problems, doesn’t it? I thought you’d already be shoving the needle in my arm by now,” Dorian said, folding his arms across his chest. He raised his nose a little, just to draw Krem’s attention to what was probably an ugly bruise by now.

“You assume you’re important enough to me to qualify as a problem,” Krem said, scowling. “But I’m sure as shit not going to be responsible for telling the Chief you got yourself killed by a demon. You need help.”

“Hands up to volunteer?” Dorian said, arching his brow. Krem and Stitches exchanged a look.

“As I thought. I got myself into this and I will get myself out of it, if you will simply give me that sedative,” Dorian said.

“You’re an idiot,” Krem said. “An absolute idiot.”

“I’ve been called worse. By you. But one way or another I’m doing this. Help or get out of the way.” Dorian raised his chin.

Stitches tapped his fingers on the table next to him. “The sedative you’re asking for--”

“It has to be powerful or I can’t reach Limbo. I’ve been reading everything I can get my hands on. Confronting Ril--the demon in his lair is my best shot. I’m not going to risk anyone else’s safety for this. Just me and him. Please, Stitches,” said Dorian.

Stitches looked at Krem again, who shook his head and walked out of the lab. Stitches pursed his lips. “You realize I could get in serious trouble for this.”

“I overpowered you and stole it. Forced you, threatened you. Pick an excuse. If I die, no one can dispute it.”

“Andraste’s ashes, Pavus,” Stitches said.

“Well, it’s true.”

Stitches hesitated a moment longer, then turned, walking to a locked cabinet at the back of the room. He pushed several vials aside on one of the shelves and reached for one behind them all. He replaced the lock, grabbed a few other supplies, then motioned Dorian toward the main room.

Once Dorian settled himself onto a cot, Stitches pushed his sleeve up and began palpating along his arm. Krem leaned against the table, watching them with a frown.

“Pavus?” Stitches said, keeping his eyes on Dorian’s arm. Dorian looked at him. Stitches sighed. “Just...be careful, all right?”

Dorian snorted. “Please, I am the soul of caution. And the most powerful mage I know.”

“Is that supposed to be comforting?” Stitches said, cleaning Dorian’s arm with a wet cloth. Dorian just smirked.

Just before Stitches uncapped the needle, though, Dorian grew serious again. He put a hand on Stitches’ wrist. “Don’t tell Bull.”

Stitches just looked at him. Dorian released his wrist and laid back. He felt the brief sting of the needle, then his vision slowly began to cloud. He saw the shape of Stitches’ head turning, and heard the distant murmur of his voice. Another shape moved, somewhere further away. Then there was darkness.

 

* * *

 

“He did _what_?” Bull said, sitting straight up in bed. He yanked the covers back and moved immediately to the side of the bed. “Why didn’t you stop him?”

“We tried,” Krem said, folding his arms as he watched Bull yank his pants up and go rummaging through a drawer for a shirt. “Stitches kept telling him it was a bad idea. He said he was going to do it one way or another.”

“Stupid, _stupid_ \--” Bull muttered, fumbling with the shirt buttons.

“Chief, I know you’re not going to listen to me, but I’m going to say it anyway. He’s right. You shouldn’t go after him,” Krem said.

Bull stopped midway to his last button. He gave Krem a withering look.

“It’s a _demon_ , Chief,” Krem said.

“No shit, Krem. You don’t want to help, fine, but I’m not letting him do this alone. Now move,” Bull said, pushing him out the door.

They made their way to the central operations room. Solas now sat with Stitches at Dorian’s cot, and they both looked up as Krem and Bull entered. Bull marched immediately to the empty cot next to Dorian’s. He began rolling his sleeve up.

“Chief--” Stitches started.

“Get me in,” Bull said. Stitches tipped his head back to the ceiling, muttering to himself, but moved to get his supplies.

“Iron Bull, you do realize how dangerous this is?” Solas said.

“Yeah, yeah, Krem beat you to trying to talk me out of it, let’s get moving,” Bull said.

“If you are determined, there are things you should know,” Solas said, standing.

“Talk fast then,” Bull said. Stitches returned, setting out his supplies on a small table next to the cot.

“You must hold tight to reality,” Solas said. “According to all available research, demons will try to alter reality, confuse it, and disorient you to make you believe their lies. They can change everything around you. Find the cracks. Rip them open. Hold on to who you are with everything you have.”

A memory blindsided Bull as Solas spoke, of a dim room somewhere in the center of Seheron, the old Re-educator with his white braids sitting at Bull’s side. _You have only one face, Hissrad, but many masks. The man beneath them all, that is the man you must always hold onto. The tide rises, the tide falls, but the sea is changeless. Let what is false wash away like waves on the sand, that the rock beneath may endure._

“Bull? Do you understand?” Solas said.

Bull swallowed and then nodded. “Right. Got it.”

“Dorian is the demon’s focus. You must help him do the same--hold on to reality. Break any illusion,” Solas said. Bull nodded again.

“Ready?” said Stitches, needle poised as he looked up at Bull.

“Do it,” Bull said.

“Good luck, Chief,” Stitches said.

_The tide rises, the tide falls…_

Bull closed his eye.

 

\---

 

Sand. He felt it under his fingers, against his cheek, scraping beneath his horns as he turned his head. A rush of water burst cold and gritty against his legs. He knew this feeling.

He took a breath, deep and slow. He smelled the salt of the sea, but also spice, earthy and strong, and old, wet wood. For a moment he swore he heard the creak of a boat in the distance, rocking on the tide. Faint shouting, something about the fish. Footsteps marching down an aging dock.

Bull closed his eye. The tide flooded in again, soaking into his trousers, collecting in his shoes, but he stayed still. This wasn’t right. He’d been here to do something, to find--someone--

 _Dorian_...

Bull lifted his head. The sounds of the dock abruptly disappeared, and the smell of spice faded beneath the salt on the wind. Ahead of him, rising above the sand, he saw not the little huts that had congregated on the Seheron seaside, but tall buildings, flanking the dune in a measured row. Not Alam. Not Seheron.

He dragged himself up out of the sand, brushing the grains from his wet clothes. The buildings looked as though they must once have been beautiful, but now they rusted where they stood. Bits of their steel frames were bared to the air where walls had worn away or collapsed. Broken windows opened onto empty rooms, from what Bull could see from the ground. As he stumbled closer along the beach, he saw glass and broken bits of plaster littering the ground.

He passed them and moved into the middle of an abandoned road beyond, cracked into jagged pieces. Weeds grew in the dirt between. Unbidden, part of Dorian’s letter came back to Bull as he stood at the edge of the road. _I won’t tell you where I’m going. Don’t look for me. Don’t come after me. It would be better if you forgot me altogether. Let me believe I’ve kept you safe, if only for a moment. This is my battle to fight._ And Bull had let him.

Fuck that.

“Dorian!” he called, cupping his hands over his mouth. His voice echoed, unanswered.

He marched down the road, letting it guide him toward the skeleton of an elaborate city. Was this the place Dorian built? Even crumbling, it was impressive, the rickety bones of the buildings hinting at their lost beauty.

He climbed over debris and sometimes whole floors that had long ago crumbled into the street. Bull paused in surprise as concrete gave way to wide panes of solid glass, laid out the same width as the road, and stretching into a wide plaza. Many of the panes were cracked or broken through, and the sound of rushing water came from below them. Bull leaned to look down through the glass, and found what looked like a river flowing underneath. He tested the strength of the panes that were still solid with his foot, and then followed it further into the city.

Buildings changed, twisting away into strange shapes. No projections met him on the sidewalk, or seemed to look out from the windows above him. No voice answered his calls, and it seemed impossible to judge how much time passed as he walked. The sun never seemed to move, yet he felt as though he’d been climbing through the twisted remains of the city for hours.

The glass eventually merged back with concrete, which led him to an open square. At the center, a fountain sat, dry and bare. Elaborate statues of humans frozen mid-dance clung to the center, leaning out over the fountain’s basin. Bare benches surrounded it, and the streets branched in every direction out from it.

“Dorian!” Bull called yet again, glancing around the square.

“Bull?” came a reply, somewhere in the distance. He looked around sharply, circling partway around the fountain.

“Dorian! Can you hear me? Where are you?” he yelled. His eye darted from street to street. Finally, Dorian rounded a corner ahead of him.

“Dorian! There you are!” Bull began to walk toward him.

“Bull, _behind you_!”

The blow came hard to the back of Bull’s head, sending him toppling forward. He caught himself before he hit the ground, kneeling on the pavement. Before he could push himself up another blow came, this time to his blind side, knocking him against the basin of the fountain.

He didn’t fall unconscious, exactly, but the world became a strange, distant sort of haze. He felt pressure at his hands, his feet, and felt himself being lifted. He heard muffled voices, and saw shapes move in front of him. He tried to lift his arms, to resist the grip on his back, but his body remained limp.

 

\---

 

When Bull came back to himself, his wrists and ankles were bound tightly. The base of his horn ached where it must have slammed into the floor. He felt cool air where his eyepatch normally shielded his skin. He blinked a few times, and the eyepatch came in focus on the floor next to him, the strap snapped.

“I knew you’d come back to me. I knew you’d keep your promise if I just kept reminding you of the things that mattered.”

The voice was soft but close. Bull squinted and blinked again until a room came into focus. A dining room, it looked like. Bull could see what looked like a kitchen through a distant doorway. In front of him was a dining table, dark wood, and seated next to each other were Dorian and the man that Bull had encountered earlier. He was cupping Dorian’s face, turned so Bull couldn’t see his expression. But he could see Dorian’s. Tears were gathering in his eyes as he gazed at the man across from him, looking as though he was being torn apart.

“Dorian,” Bull groaned, trying to push himself upright. He managed to get up onto his knees. “Dorian…”

Dorian’s eyes flickered to him. His companion reached up with his other hand and turned his face back.

“Don’t listen to him,” he said, a little louder. “He doesn’t matter. He can’t. He can’t even fathom what we have shared.”

A tear slipped down Dorian’s cheek. “Rilienus.”

“It’s a demon, Dorian,” Bull said. “Don’t let it get into your head.”

“You know the truth, darling. I am more real than anything else. This place--our place--this whole world we built together, this is where you truly belong. This is what your heart longs for. To stay here, with me.” Rilienus stroked his thumb over Dorian’s cheek. “I _am_ what is real to you.”

Dorian drew in a stuttering breath. He lifted a hand to cover Rilienus’s, and Bull’s heart sank.

“Oh, love,” Dorian said softly, closing his eyes. “If only you were real. If only you had stayed with _me_. But I made a choice, and drove you to some unspeakable place I never meant to.”

“I’m here now,” Rilienus said. “I’m here now, and we can be together, the way you promised. You can make it up to me.”

Dorian held Rilienus’s hand in both of his. “I miss you more than I have words for, Rilienus. I’ve clung for so long to your memory, and made you what you are. But I could never make you as beautiful and wonderful as the real man. And it’s long past time I accept that. I need to let you go.”

“No,” Rilienus said, shaking his head. He wrenched his hand out of Dorian’s, standing so quickly his chair tipped over. Outside, through a far window, Bull saw the clouds move and darken at an unnatural speed. Rilienus glanced back at him over his shoulder, and his eyes flashed bright red. He grabbed something off the table, and in the moment it took Bull to blink, Rilienus was standing behind him. Bull felt cold steel at his neck.

“Choose me,” Rilienus growled. “Give yourself to me, or I’ll take him instead.”

Dorian’s eyes met Bull’s. Dorian swallowed, then looked up at Rilienus. “If you kill him--”

“Killing him only wakes him,” Rilienus said. “Oh no, I wouldn’t do that. He’ll stay the way you promised you would, and he will be mine. Maybe that’s the face you really wanted me to have? I’ll enjoy seeing you through his eye.”

Dorian looked at Bull again, pain bending his brow. Bull tried as carefully as he could to shake his head without jarring the knife.

“Yes or no,” Rilienus said, drawing the blade closer and making Bull suck in a sharp breath.

“All right. All right, yes,” Dorian said. “Just let him go.”

“Dorian, no--” Bull started. The knife left his neck.

“I knew you’d see reason,” Rilienus said, coming around Bull and setting the knife on the table. Dorian gave him a weak smile, opening his arms.

 

[ ](http://fanjapanologist.tumblr.com/post/165141499333/adoribull-minibang-time-heres-my-illustrations)

 

As Rilienus stepped into his embrace, Dorian’s hands ignited in flame behind his back. He grabbed Rilienus’s shoulders, and Rilienus screamed, his face twisting, his body contorting. As his skin burned beneath Dorian’s hands, his image began to flicker between Rilienus and something else, something strange and wrong.

Outside, the storm broke. Rain poured down, spattering the window. Lightning forked across the sky. Dorian raised one flaming hand and wrapped it around the demon’s neck, lifting him. He raised the other, and lightning shattered the window to reach his fingertips, crackling between them. He drove his hand into the demon’s chest. The creature roared in agony.

“Farewell, Rilienus,” Dorian said quietly, as Rilienus’s face flickered away for the last time. In its place, the face of the demon remained. Then that, too, was gone, in an explosion of light and magic.

Bull turned his face away as the light grew too bright, shutting his eye. When he looked back, Dorian stood alone, staring at his hands. The storm outside passed as quickly as it had come, and a few rays of sunlight peeked through the broken window.

“Dorian,” Bull whispered.

Dorian dropped his hands. He shook his head, then turned to Bull. But as their eyes met, the world around Bull shifted and narrowed. He started to say Dorian’s name again, but he felt everything begin to slip from him.

He didn’t shock awake. It was slow, as though he’d been buried in sand and was feeling the grains roll away one by one. He felt a touch to his arm--tape peeling away, gauze pressing against his skin. His eye opened slowly to see the basement’s wooden ceiling. When he could lift his head, which felt strange and heavy, he looked immediately to the chair next to him.

Dorian was already sitting up. Stitches held one arm, freeing the needle from it, but Dorian seemed hardly to notice. He was staring at his other hand.

“Hey,” Bull croaked. He cleared his throat and reached groggily to touch Dorian’s arm. He said again, clearer, “Hey.”

Dorian blinked several times and then looked at Bull’s hand, then up at his face, almost as though seeing him for the first time.

“He’s gone,” Dorian said slowly, his voice thin.

“I know,” Bull said. Stitches moved away, carrying his tools back somewhere behind them.

“ _Vishante kaffas_ , he’s really--” Dorian stared at his hands again.

Bull tried to sit up a little more. Shit, that drug was strong. He felt a little like he was moving under water, his limbs resisting every time he tried to move them. But if it was affecting Dorian the same way, he showed little sign.

“I need--I’m sorry, I need to--” Dorian sat the rest of the way up and began to push himself out of the chair. Bull’s hand fell away.

“Take it easy,” Stitches said, reappearing around the side of Bull’s chair. “That serum--”

“It’s fine. I need--I need a moment,” Dorian said, stumbling a little bit but waving Stitches away.

“Dorian--” Stitches called, hand half-raised. Dorian only moved to the stairs without looking back, disappearing through the door.

“Shit,” Bull muttered, rubbing a hand against his eye. He tried to stand, but a wave of dizziness hit him and forced him to sit back. _Dorian…_

 

\---

 

Evening had long since fallen by the time Bull shuffled back to his room. The serum left him groggy and exhausted, but sleep was the last thing on his mind. He’d looked for Dorian, ducking first into the tavern, then following the guard’s walk along the edge of the fortress wall, until it led him back to his room. He pushed the door open wearily.

Dorian sat on the end of Bull’s bed, looking up as the door opened. Bull stopped in the doorway, his hand dropping from the handle. Dorian’s eyes were red-rimmed and glassy but alert, even bright, despite the exhaustion that hunched his shoulders. Bull stepped the rest of the way inside and pushed the door shut.

“I didn’t know where else to go,” Dorian said. He looked back down at his lap.

Bull slipped a hand into his pocket. His fingers closed around the chess piece waiting there, and he lifted it out, measuring the weight in his palm. He nodded to himself and set it on the dresser. Then he moved to the bed and sat down slowly next to Dorian.

For a long moment, neither of them spoke. Then Bull reached across the few inches he’d left between them, covering Dorian’s hand with his. Dorian let out a shaky breath. He turned his hand to press their palms together, sliding his fingers between Bull’s.

“You’re supposed to give up,” Dorian said, his voice scraping in his throat.

“Couldn’t do that,” Bull said.

“You promised me you wouldn’t interfere,” Dorian said.

“I couldn’t just--”

“You don’t _understand_ ,” Dorian said, his voice rising sharply on the last word. He shut his eyes, swallowing heavily, and then let out a slow breath to steady himself. When he spoke again, his voice was quiet. “I watched madness take Rilienus. I watched it kill him. All because of me. I do not have it in me to watch that happen again. And it very nearly did.”

If Bull closed his eye, he could still feel the demon’s hands sliding over his shoulders. It would have been bad enough to feel a cold, clawed, unnatural touch biting into his skin, the way it used to in the nightmares that woke him screaming as a child. Maybe it was like that, underneath. But those hands, when Bull felt them, were human, and warm, the grip almost soft. And that was so much worse.

Dorian’s fingers tightened around his, drawing Bull’s gaze back to him. Dorian frowned, studying Bull’s face for a moment.

“When are you going to let someone protect you for once?” he said.

“You first,” said Bull. Dorian scoffed, but it did bring a thin sort of smile to his lips.

Bull looked down at their hands. “I was so scared of demons when I was little. The other kids used to tease me about it. Stupid thing to be afraid of, some imaginary monsters that Tama made up to make us behave. But I thought--what if it happened to me? What if it got inside my head?”

_I’ll enjoy seeing you through his eye._

Dorian squeezed his hand again, as though reading his thoughts. Bull moved his other hand, cradling Dorian’s in both of his. Finally, he said, “But seeing one up close--the worst part wasn’t what it could do to me. The worst part was imagining what it was going to do to you. That’s why I went after you. I made a call. I couldn’t handle losing you to that--thing. If there was a chance I could save you, I sure as shit was going to take it.”

Bull looked back up to find Dorian staring at him, stricken. His eyes filled with tears, and he blinked them away, pursing his lips.

“You stubborn, ridiculous man,” Dorian said, his voice shaky. “You’re unbearable.”

"Yeah, well," Bull said with a shrug, smirking. "You're no fucking prize."

Dorian laughed softly, though a tear slipped down his cheek. Bull reached for him, wiping it away with his thumb. When he started to pull away, Dorian caught his wrist. He turned his head and pressed a lingering kiss to Bull’s palm. Bull’s heart leapt. But a moment later Dorian stiffened a little, frowning, and slid away from Bull’s hands to stand and walk to one of the windows along the wall.

 

[ ](http://fanjapanologist.tumblr.com/post/165141499333/adoribull-minibang-time-heres-my-illustrations)

 

“Bull, I--” he started, then hesitated. “I don’t know--where to go from here. I spent so long running from my grief, trying to distract myself from it or bury it, I hardly know how to feel now that it’s supposed to be over.” He looked over his shoulder at Bull. “Is it strange that it feels like I’ve lost him all over again?”

“Shit, no, Dorian--what you had to do today?” Bull said. “That had to be fucking hard.”

Dorian turned back to the window. “I keep seeing his face. He looked the same, the first time. Stunned and--betrayed. It was a demon, I know it was a demon, but I--”

He cut himself off, burying his head his hands. Bull curled his fingers into the bedspread, longing to touch him.

“You need time,” he said instead.

“I’ve had so much time. I’ve _wasted_ so much time,” Dorian said. “Surely by now--”

“It’s not that simple,” Bull said.

Dorian lifted his head, his hands falling away. One of them slipped into his pocket, pulling something out and holding it in front of him, where Bull couldn’t see.

“No, I suppose it isn’t,” he said after a moment. He turned back around. “There’s...still a lot for us to talk about. I’m not--going to ask you to wait while I--”

“Dorian,” Bull said. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Dorian pursed his lips. He fiddled with something in his hands, then placed it up on the window sill. It was the hourglass Bull recognized as Dorian’s totem. They both watched the sand slip through the middle and down into the base for a moment, before their eyes met again.

“You think I’d jump into Limbo for just anyone?” Bull said.

Dorian gave a short little laugh. “I hate to break it to you, Bull, but you are a bit of a bleeding heart.”

“Point is,” Bull said, as Dorian continued to grin, “We’ll figure it out. We’re kind of stuck with each other until we see this Calpernia thing through.”

“If I still have a job in the morning.” Dorian said. He moved back to the bed, sitting close against Bull’s side. “I imagine there is an extremely unpleasant conversation with the Inquisitor in my future.”

“Hey, I’ve got your back,” Bull said. He tentatively moved his arm to rest along Dorian’s back, and when Dorian didn’t protest, he leaned a little closer. “I’ll tell them what I saw. Besides, they can’t lose you now, you’re the first person to kill a demon in centuries.”

Dorian sighed, leaning his head against Bull’s bicep. “Well, isn’t it nice to be needed.”

Bull chuckled. “We’ll get through this.”

Dorian glanced up at him. He pursed his lips into a small smile. “Yes, I imagine we will.”

Behind them, still sitting alone on the window sill, the last few grains of sand slipped down the bottom of the hourglass, forgotten.

**Author's Note:**

> Suicide Discussion: during the scene where Krem demands an explanation from Dorian in the library. When Dorian gets to telling Krem about finding Rilienus in the hotel room, skip to where Krem says "Fasta vass."
> 
> Graphic violence: several times when Bull finds Dorian in the Fade. When he reaches a plaza with a dry fountain, he'll be knocked out and tied up. During Dorian's talk with Rilienus, Rilienus will grab a knife to hold him hostage, and Dorian will then trick Rilienus into coming close enough for him to kill with magic. That last part is rather detailed. If you need to, skip to the next scene.


End file.
